Dreams of a Field Agent
by lithromantic
Summary: Cate's first years as a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent prepare her to work with an elite team. She's a leader, a strategist, and she's ready to do her part; but really, how well can one determined person keep up with a volatile group of super-beings?
1. Chapter 1

No matter how stressful things were on the ground, running through flight maneuvers at supersonic speed always seemed to clear Cate's mind. Unfortunately, this time the source of her stress was in the fighter jet next to hers and doing a sloppy job of staying in formation.

"Lieutenant Mills," a voice barked into her helmet, "Keep your wingman in line!"

"Yes, sir," she responded, then switched channels and glanced out the side of her window at the other jet, "Storm, straighten up and let's run that maneuver one more time. Try to follow my lead for once in your miserable life."

"Sounds really fun, Lieutenant," came his sarcastic reply and she could just picture the snotty look on Johnny's smug, handsome face.

She took a slow breath through her oxygen mask to calm herself. Up here, she outranked him and she had to maintain control of her frustrations. Whatever arguments had taken place over the last few weeks, whatever fights had gone down, whatever items had been broken and boxes of belongings tossed out...none of it could be allowed to effect her leadership in flight.

"On second thought," he cut in to her concentration, "I've never liked your idea of fun. How about a detour?"

His craft disappeared from her peripheral and she glanced down at her radar screen to see her wingman's blip arcing off toward the arctic tundra, "Storm, what are you doing? Get back in formation!" He didn't answer and she had no choice but to turn her jet and chase him until the ground and sky were both a blur of white out her window, "Knock it off, Johnny! At this speed, we're not going to be in the neutral zone for long."

"What's the matter, Mills? Getting a little cold?" he mocked.

Chatter from the base burst into her ear but she knew exactly what they were going to say upon viewing the unorthodox flight plan and she didn't need to hear it, so she disabled that channel for the moment.

"Turn around now, Sergeant Storm, that is an order!" she raised her voice, then heard the chime warning and looked down at her instruments to find that they had crossed over into Russian airspace, "Damn it, Johnny, why do you have to be such a hothead?! We're both going to get court-martialled for this!"

"Only if they catch us," came his reply, "I assume you switched off comms with the base too?"

"Of course I did, idiot. You think I need to hear their threats right now?"

"Seems like we're both having an equipment malfunction, then. Oh no."

"That won't wor-" her argument was cut off by the alarm indicating incoming fighters, "Soviet defense inbound. Stay on me and don't fly aggressive. If they follow us back into the neutral zone, we cannot start an international incident. I hate you so much."

"Copy that, Cate. You are also the worst."

Pulling her jet into a turn so sharp that she had to clench her teeth against the g-forces, Cate directed her path away from the approaching craft and back towards safe airspace. She was annoyed but not surprised when Johnny Storm's jet copied her maneuver exactly and only a fraction of a second after her. They had always been able to work in incredible sync on their good days and his skill far surpassed his rank, but discipline had been the main factor holding him back.

A new alarm sounded and Cate glanced down with wide eyes to find that a target lock was being acquired on her position, "Evade!"

In perfect coordination, the two jets rolled away from each other and a missile sailed through the empty space left behind.

"They're not messing around," he finally sounded serious.

"You think?!" Cate growled.

"Permission to engage?"

"Denied," she snapped, "We're not going to start a war. We must have gotten close to something sensitive. Let's keep moving out of the area and hope they give up the chase."

"Sounds like a coward's solution, Lieutenant," he argued, "If they didn't want a fight, they shouldn't have started one."

"Johnny, don't you dare."

As she watched him peel away to go rogue, she briefly entertained the thought of continuing on her escape course and letting him take on the pair of Russian fighters by himself. Whether she liked it or not at the moment, they were still a team and they were bound to go down together after this stunt; but she'd rather have that on her conscience than his death. She pulled a sharp turn to follow him and saw the flash of a missile launching from his jet. They were past the point of no return now, with shots being fired on both sides. The dogfight lasted only a few seconds before one of the enemy jets started trailing smoke and retreated. His remaining wingman seemed intent on chasing Johnny down, despite the American's extreme flying. Cate recognized his movements as a maneuver that would set her up for a clear shot at his pursuer, so her finger tensed over the launch button.

Suddenly a flash caught her eye against the landscape below and she cried, "Surface fire!"

The proper response was for both of them to pull up, and her well-practiced reflexes on the stick did just that. She only had a split second to wonder why Johnny was cutting sideways instead before the missile from their aerial attacker that had been locked on him clipped her wing as a result of his dodge. Instruments went haywire as her jet corkscrewed into an unrecoverable diving spin. Counting on luck more than skill, she pulled the eject lever and hoped that she wasn't about to launch herself into the ground. The canopy blew away and she felt the blast of cold air hit her as her seat rocketed, thankfully, toward the sky and deployed its parachute.

"Cate!" she heard Johnny yell through their comm just before the explosion of her jet hitting the ground drowned out all other noise.

She looked around, but her wingmate and his pursuer had been moving so fast that they were no longer in view, even with the clear sky. Before he could get too far out of range, she replied, "I ejected. I'm fine." A distant explosion punctuated the sky and she felt a pang of dread, "Johnny?"

After a long, tense moment, she heard his voice crackle through her helmet, "Got 'im! I'll come back around for y-"

"No," she snapped, "Get clear of Russian airspace before there's more trouble. I'll call for evac when I land. I don't want to see your face."

"Copy that," was all he said and the static cut out as he reached the limit of their comm range.

At last, Cate started to focus on her own predicament and reached up to grab the guiding lines to steer her parachute. As she started to scan the terrain for the best landing spot, two things occurred to her in quick succession. Firstly, why did something look a little bit strange about a large section of the ground below? And secondly, where had that surface-to-air rocket come from in the middle of this wilderness? The answer to both questions became obvious the closer she got. There was some sort of camouflaged structure down there and it was heavily guarded. No wonder jets had been scrambled so quickly when they crossed into this area.

When she was close enough to see motion on the rooftop of the building, she also heard the small arms fire start whizzing past. Panicking, she pulled her legs up onto the seat and yanked on the steering lines to speed up her spiraling descent. If she had been on a combat mission, she would have had a weapon strapped to her, but this was supposed to be a simple training exercise, so she was completely unarmed.

"Johnny!" she called uselessly through the comm that nobody was close enough to pick up anymore, "Command! Anyone?!"

Nobody was going to help her. She'd have to think of something on her own. Looking around at her options, she decided that she didn't want to land out in the open as target practice. She might stand a slight chance of surviving, though, if she crashed into the compound and holed up until she could call for evac - a _very_ slight chance.

She made the path of her parachute as erratic as possible, but it was quickly developing tears from bullet holes and a few pinged off her seat too close for comfort. Aiming for the building, she unbuckled and waited until moments before impact before diving off her chair and falling a nauseating distance down onto the rooftop. The landing was painful and she rolled to a stop behind some kind of ventilation chimney containing a grate which she immediately started kicking in while more gunfire tracked its way toward her. Under her aggressive beating, the panel clattered away and she dove into the opening, sliding down a short incline into what appeared to be a long, straight duct. It was just big enough for her to army crawl forward, so she moved as quickly as possible, cursing the noise her helmet made every time it bumped against the metal walls. Every dozen feet for so, vents opened up into the rooms below, filling the tunnel with flashing lights and alarm sounds.

When Cate reached the first of these openings, she peered through at what looked like a science lab where techs in white bio suits were scrambling to pack up their equipment. The crates they were filling had a strange octopus symbol that didn't look like the logo for any Russian groups she had ever been briefed on. Suddenly her view was cut off when the vent slammed shut and she glanced up her path to see all the other openings sealing up in succession, plunging the duct into complete darkness. A few seconds later, she felt the cold sensation of the air around her starting to move and she reached up to reattach her oxygen mask and press it tightly over her nose and mouth. Nevertheless, whatever was in the air started making her eyes sting. Crawling as quickly as she could, she got her foot within reach of the vent she had been looking through, then knocked it open with a couple frantic kicks.

Not even caring if any of the techs below were armed, she pushed herself feet-first through the new opening and dropped into the lab. For a moment, everyone was startled and just stood there staring at each other. Cate made out four figures through her watering eyes and beyond them, a door to the next room, so she brought her arms up and blinked away the tears rapidly, preparing to fight her way through them. She'd only received nominal hand-to-hand combat experience during basic training, but she was pretty sure she could take out a few scientists, especially with the advantage of a helmet and gloves. The techs, seemingly weighing their chances also, hesitated to engage her and in their hesitation began to cough on the air hissing in through the broken vent.

As soon as they were all covering their mouths with their hands, Cate shoved past them to the door. She burst through it, spun around, and bolted it shut behind her; then turned to find herself in a smaller room with two more techs. Once again, everyone froze for a second to study each other, and Cate brought up her arms to quickly wipe her eyes and get into a fighting stance. Suddenly, the smaller of the two techs lashed out at her partner with an attack so fast that Cate didn't even have time to move out of the way before the man hit the floor at her feet.

The remaining girl chewed her lip thoughtfully as she looked up and down at Cate's flight suit, advising in perfect English, "You should change out of that."

Not wasting a moment, Cate unsnapped her mask, pulled off her helmet, and unzipped her jumpsuit as quickly as she could, while her rescuer started stripping the bio suit off the unconscious man. Though she still couldn't see with total clarity yet, her impression of the unexpected ally was that she was very pretty, with red hair a few shades brighter than her own and a very cold default expression. They seemed to be around the same age, though Cate was several inches taller.

"You're American?" Cate asked as she put on the stolen suit.

"Not exactly," the girl answered, then looked around the lab with a frustrated frown, "Your little flyover stunt cut my mission short, so do me a favor and tuck a couple of those tubes into your pocket. Whatever you do, don't let them break."

"What are they?" she carefully pulled a couple glass vials out of one of the octopus-labelled containers and slid them into her pocket.

"Bio-weapons," she said simply.

"Are you kidding?!" Cate hissed, "This is insane!"

"Here," the girl handed Cate a small handgun, "Backup is already on the way. We just need to get ourselves outside to meet them."

Wondering just what she'd gotten herself into, Cate put on the domed head-cover that the girl pulled out of a locker for her before donning her own. With a gun in one pocket and deadly chemicals in the other, she followed the helpful stranger out into the busy hallway, where she noticed that they were the only ones wearing their full bio-suit headgear. A few others had basic masks over the bottom half of their face, but otherwise, the two of them were a bit conspicuous. Gaining a few strange looks already, it certainly didn't help that Cate was nearly walking sideways in an attempt to protect the hip that held the poison. A couple times, someone passing by would stop and ask them something to which the other girl would answer harshly in Russian.

As quickly as they could, they were nearing the end of the hallway, where Cate could see the sweet glow of sunlight streaming through the narrow window in the exit door. Between the freedom of the outdoors and them, however, was an armed guard. Cate was prepared to redirect, but her ally marched straight up to the guard without slowing and yelled something at him. He spread his feet a little wider and snapped something back at her, looking with a stern glare between her and Cate.

He directed some sort of question toward the smaller girl and she gave a quick answer in an annoyed tone. Then he turned to Cate and asked the same question. For a moment, she was frozen and couldn't comprehend anything except the pounding of her own heartbeat in her ears; but she'd always had a way with languages and she surprised herself by repeating the answer she had heard her comrade give with a similar tone and the best accent she could manage. Unfortunately, this apparently wasn't the right answer when coming from her and the guard started to raise his rifle. Cate jumped back as the other girl lashed out with a quick series of jabs and kicks that sent the weapon flying and the guard sprawling onto the ground.

"Go!" the girl yelled as soon as the doorway was clear.

Cate could already hear shouting and running from down the hallway as she fumbled with the strange handle-latch on the exit. A shot rang out behind her and she felt the tug of the bullet passing through the fabric of her head covering before clanging into the metal door. Adrenaline turning her blood to ice-water immediately, she pulled out her handgun and spun around, lining up a shot and taking out her target before she was even completely turned. Although she had never been in a real shootout before, marksmanship was one of her top skills and favorite hobbies, so instinct took over pretty easily.

Beside her, the other girl had pulled out another gun and was covering the adjacent hallway. With her free hand, Cate finally got the latch turned and shoved the door open for them to make their escape.

"Careful! They're on the roof too," Cate warned as they ripped off their cumbersome headpieces and started running away from the building.

As if to emphasize her point, she turned and shot a guard who had raced to the edge to investigate the commotion. He toppled off the roof and hit the ground with a heavy thud while the girl fixed Cate with an approving look.

The look grew suddenly distant and she put her hand to her ear, mysteriously declaring, "It's about time. Yeah, she'll have to come with us."

"Huh?" Cate looked around, "Who are you talking to?"

Then ahead of them, out of thin air, there was a flickering and a strangely-shaped jet of some sort faded into view. The back end of it lowered down into a ramp, and at the top of that ramp was a guy with a bow drawn and an arrow aimed toward them. Cate flinched as he released the shot, but the arrow sailed over them and hit the rooftop beyond with an unexpectedly large explosion. Her rescuer was running toward the ramp, so Cate followed her up and it closed behind them. The archer patted the girl's shoulder wordlessly and sized Cate up as he walked past her toward the cockpit. He was probably several years older than her and yet also a few inches shorter.

"Who are you people?" she finally demanded, "What's going on here?"

Ignoring the questions, the girl held out her hand, "You still have those tubes?"

"Yeah," Cate pulled out the vials carefully and placed them in the girl's palm, "Please tell me we are not about to heat up the cold war."

"Thank you for your assistance," she replied as she placed the vials in a container with a bird logo on the lid.

Before Cate was even done thinking about the fact that there were now two organizations at play that she didn't recognize, she felt a pinch in her arm as the girl bumped it with her fist. She glanced down to see a tiny syringe sticking out from the sleeve of her bio suit, and she had just enough time to glare in betrayal at the girl before passing out.

_A few days later_…

The office door opened and Johnny Storm shuffled out, looking far less humiliated than he should have, considering the amount of yelling Cate had heard coming from the General. Cate glanced from the dishonorable discharge paperwork in his hand up to his face and his mouth twitched up in an apologetic smile. She simply glared back and stood up for her turn having her ass handed to her because of him.

"Lieutenant Mills," the General greeted hoarsely as she closed the door behind her, "I should be throwing you and your former wingman in prison for the incident you caused."

"Yes, sir."

"Lucky for you, the enemy you engaged with was not Russian military."

This was unexpected, but she remained quiet.

"Nevertheless," he continued and stood up from his seat, sliding a paper across his desk, "I am discharging you from your position with the United States Air Force."

"Yes, sir," she said quietly, staring down at the paper.

The General reached over and pressed a button on his desk phone, "Send him in."

Despite what he had said, Cate expected security to come in with handcuffs for her; but when the door opened, it was a kind looking man in a nice suit that entered. The General nodded at the man then left his office, so that she was alone with the newcomer.

"Miss Mills," the man smiled, "I'm Agent Phil Coulson with S.H.I.E.L.D. and I have an offer for you."


	2. Chapter 2

_Several years later_…

"I would say it feels good to be back," Clint stepped out of the jet's cabin and looked around at the Washington D.C. base, "But this is where the paperwork begins."

Cate followed him out, rolling her sore shoulders, "Ugh, I'd take Hydra goons over mission reports any day."

"Let's just get it over with," Natasha joined them at the top of the ramp and they all walked down together, "Then we'll have a few days off. Anyone got any good plans? Cate, I know you're probably going to head up to New York for a peek at the ice man. Too bad you were with us instead of on _that_ operation."

"Please," she shivered, "There are very few things that could get me up on an arctic project again, and digging out the remains of my childhood hero is not one of them. New York does sound nice, though. If I didn't hurt all over, I'd hit the clubs for sure. I've got a lot of pent-up tension that I need to dance out." She elbowed Clint with a conspiratorial grin, "I suppose you'll be taking a little _vacation_."

Natasha smiled as well. "Vacation" was the word they used for visiting Clint's family that only they and the director knew about.

"You're welcome to come along," he looked at both of them, "You know how much the vacation staff loves having you."

The ladies looked at each other, seriously considering the option of a relaxing trip to the country to play with babies. Before a decision could be made, though, they were intercepted in the hallway by the last person they wanted to see at that moment.

"Just the agents I was hoping to find," Directory Fury folded his arms, "I've got special assignments for each of you."

Clint sighed, but the ladies managed to contain their disappointed reactions.

"We've got an interesting bit of alien tech to study at our facility in the Mojave, and I need someone to keep an eye on it," he explained, "Barton, I'm assigning you to Project P.E.G.A.S.U.S.. Head out immediately after filing your report from the last mission. And for you two," his eye moved between the two redheads, "I've got a couple sensitive targets that I need you to get close to for assessment. First, we've got a reckless billionaire with military-grade weapons flying around, unchecked, in an indestructible power suit…"

Knowing exactly who the director was talking about and the reputation that preceded him, Cate announced "not it!" a moment before Natasha did.

"This is not a choose-your-own-assignment situation," Fury scowled, "Romanoff, you're on Stark."

Cate tried not to snicker and Natasha tried not to growl. Clint didn't even try to hide his grin.

"Mills, you were specially requested. Report to Agent Coulson's office in New York and he'll fill you in on your target," the director concluded.

Cate beamed as her partners fixed her with jealous glares. Everyone loved working with Coulson, and it certainly sounded more promising than infiltrating Stark's inner circle or guarding alien tech at a remote research lab.

_The next day_...

"Isn't he beautiful?" Coulson said in a quiet, reverent voice.

Cate merely nodded, too overcome with awe to speak. Lying on a table in front of them was a large metal pod with a round viewing window frosted around the edges and glowing with blue light. Inside the pod, they could see a human figure encased in a thin layer of dripping ice. But even with the obstructed view, they both recognized the man very well.

No wonder Coulson requested her for this assignment. They were both well-known fans of vintage things - Phil with his car and trading cards; Cate with her propaganda posters and big band music. Each of them had at least one item in their locker with this very man's picture on it, though neither had ever entertained even their wildest dream that they'd ever get to see him in real life.

"Captain America," she finally whispered in the same respectful tone, "How is he even in one piece? We've both seen the documentaries, Phil. His plane crashed into the ocean."

"It was a tough plane," he shrugged, "Apparently, it became encased in ice and flash-froze the poor guy until our teams found him a few days ago, as I'm sure you heard. Thanks to his biological enhancements, he went into a kind of hibernation rather than freezing to death."

"So he's not dead?" Cate touched the cool glass and looked closer at the frozen face, "Brain levels?"

"Slow, but steady," he nodded hopefully, "He's alive in there somewhere. This pod is designed to thaw him out at a gradual, safe pace to reduce damaging any body systems. As for his mind...we'll just have to hope he eventually wakes up, but there's no machine that can help with that. If for any reason, the process fails and we lose him completely, there is another measure." He gave her one of those looks that preceded top-secret information, "Project T.A.H.I.T.I."

"Tahiti?" she repeated.

"It's a project I'm heading that's a bit above your security level, but I'll send you the breakdown anyway. We've got alien biological materials that are capable of curing any human physical failing, including death. I haven't perfected the results yet, but my team will have it right before we ever have to use it on anyone in the Avengers Initiative. If the thawing goes wrong, though, we'll have no choice but to try it on the Captain."

Cate blinked, "Wait, the Avengers Initiative? I thought that was scrapped?"

"So does everyone who's not working on it," he raised an eyebrow at her, "But I want you working on it. Starting with the recovery of Captain America."

She frowned in confusion, "But why me? Poor man's in a coma and I'm a field agent, not a scientist or a doctor."

He fixed her with a warm smile, "If Captain Rogers wakes up, we'll have to ease him back into the world slowly. He'll require a partner to monitor his progress and assess his potential for a role with the Avengers. For now, I just need someone to help me design a holding room and play the part of a period-accurate nurse to gain his trust. I could think of nobody better than you."

"I appreciate that," she beamed, "I've got some ideas already."

"Excellent. In the meantime, you and I will be keeping an eye on his recovery and preparing for all outcomes."

The progress turned out to be pretty slow and the super soldier's body adapted to the thaw without any issues, which also made it boring. Cate spent most of her time sitting next to the pod while digging through the records of previously-MIA Captain Steven Grant Rogers, familiarizing herself with Project T.A.H.I.T.I., and studying up on everything in the Avengers Initiative. Phil joined her often, and though he was the lead coordinator for tracking all potential candidates for the Initiative, it was clear that he was grooming her to be his right-hand agent. They bonded over the 1940's facade they were putting together; and in their hunt for authentic vintage items, many Captain America-themed gifts were exchanged.

It was a happy day when the ice was completely thawed and they finally moved the Captain out of the pod and onto a special bed to continue recovering at room temperature. The unconscious man's body seemed to adapt even faster with this change, and by the end of the first day, his skin had gone from death-cold to cool-to-the-touch. Cate worried that at this rate, he could wake up sooner than expected, so she sent Phil a text and set to work preparing the patient, herself.

By the time Phil arrived, he could do nothing but pout when he saw the results, "You changed him without me!"

"Hey, his body is recovering at an exponential rate," Cate smoothed the white army shirt over his slowly-rising chest and mumbled, "We may have ordered a size too small…"

"I was getting a new mission briefing from the director," Phil explained regretfully and lifted the blanket to tuck their patient in, "God, Mills, you got to change his pants too?"

"'Got to'?" she repeated with a smile, "Look, Coulson, if you want me to describe it to you, I will; but in Captain Rogers' defense, he was still a bit cold...not that that made anything any less impressive…"

"I hate you so much," he shook his head.

"Really? Because how else was I supposed to get you...this?" she reached into a bin and pulled out the red, white, and blue uniform.

Phil gasped as he snatched it from her hands, "You won't tell anyone if I try it on?"

"Are you kidding?" she smirked, "That was the first thing I did too."

He was already headed for the door as he looked over his shoulder at her, "I haaaaaaaaaaaaaaate you."

Shaking her head with a chuckle, Cate grabbed the grooming kit and moved up to the sleeping man's head. With a black and white photo from the files in one hand and a comb in the other, she styled his hair into something that would feel familiar to him; then she moved her attention down to his face and glared at the five o'clock shadow on his jaw. He really was regaining body functions fast.

As she slathered his stubble with cream, she was struck by just how much he looked like her ex-boyfriend. Geez, she hadn't thought about him in a while. She'd never seen the resemblance in her old posters, but now face-to-face, it was almost eerie - though Johnny had been a little slimmer, his hair totally different, and his eyes such a bright blue. According to the files, Captain Rogers had blue eyes too, though she'd never seen a colored picture to prove it and she wasn't about to pry his eyelids open to check. His skin was already starting to warm up, and too much prodding around might just wake him before they were ready.

She was in the middle of shaving his chin with very careful strokes when Phil slipped back into the room in full ill-fitting costume and Cate choked on her laughter, "Damn it, Coulson, I almost slit his throat!"

"I would kill you," he said with wide, serious eyes, "I'm leaving you in charge of him for a while, so try not to maim him."

"How long will you be gone?" she tried to hide her disappointment as she returned to shaving.

"Hard to tell," he confided, "Sounds like an 0-8-4 crashed in New Mexico and the director wants me to go check it out."

"Well, hurry back. As soon as I transfer him into our room, I'm implementing a strict time capsule policy. No more modern items allowed to be visible in there and no personnel permitted in without costume," she gestured to the baggy Captain America suit, "And I don't mean that one. It belongs in a museum."

"Agreed. I'm going to have a new one made up for him in case your assessment goes well and he does decide to join the Initiative," Phil sighed as he stared at the sleeping soldier, "Well, it sounds like the Captain is in good hands. Take care of him until I get back."

"I won't let you down, Coulson," she promised.

"I know you won't," he patted her back before slipping out of the room and leaving her alone with a heavy feeling of responsibility on her shoulders.

_Several days later_…

It was just about lunchtime when Cate dragged herself into the dressing room to get ready for the beginning of her 12-hour shift. She glanced up at the monitor on the wall and saw the familiar hospital room setting with its false window imitating the midday sunlight. The overnight nurse in his old-fashioned doctor's coat was just standing up from his chair and eagerly shuffling out of the room to end his watch. That particular agent always had a hard time keeping himself entertained during his shift without access to any modern tech. His only comfort was listening to old sports games, which sounded even more boring to Cate. She already had her datapad loaded up with a lively 1940's playlist that she would send to the room's radio before heading in.

As soon as she was dressed in her vintage uniform, she decided to indulge in a little technology before holing up in the time capsule zone. She dialed a party line on her datapad and started working on her makeup as both video feeds popped up on her screen.

"Hey, ladies," Clint greeted, "Sorry I didn't get the curly-hair memo."

"Wow, Nat," Cate noticed too, "Is that a perm? Do billionaires go for that kind of thing?"

"Shut up," she smirked, "It's only until the end of this job. I'm about ready to write my assessment of Stark and, believe me, it's not going to be pretty. Besides, look at you. Is that lipstick? Do 90-year-old frozen vegetables go for that kind of thing?"

"Shut up," it was Cate's turn to blush, "He may be in a coma, but when it's an undercover assignment, I go undercover, dammit."

"You girls and your dress-up missions," Clint rolled his eyes, "I'll guard alien weapons in my combat suit all day, thank you. They pulled me off P.E.G.A.S.U.S. temporarily to come watch some hammer in New Mexico."

Cate brightened, "With Coulson?"

"Yeah, Coulson's running this freak show," he hit some buttons and a security cam photo filled up his part of the screen, "And check out the freak."

Both Cate and Natasha leaned forward to inspect the picture of the tall, blonde man with soaking wet shirt clinging to his ridiculously muscular chest and arms.

"Damn, Barton, you get all the good jobs," Cate muttered as she felt her chest tighten inexplicably.

"One second," Natasha said suddenly and they saw her turn and touch something on her desk, switching to her professional voice, "No problem, Ms. Potts, I'll bring those right up." She spun back to the camera, "Sorry, guys, gotta go."

"Bye, then," Clint's voice emanated from the photo of the blonde guy.

"No worries, catch up later," Cate promised and swiped away both feeds, then gave her face one last powder in the mirror.

She stood and glanced up again at the monitor, then froze - her patient was awake and sitting up on the edge of the bed. She gasped and ran towards the door to the fake room, pausing in front of it to calm herself and get into character, though she couldn't stop her heart from pounding. After all the pictures, all the videos, all the files, all the studying...she knew more about this man than she did about her best friends, and now she was about to meet him for the first time. Would he be himself? Or was there any brain damage from the long freeze? Either way, this would be a very delicate reintroduction to the world for him. She had to be careful.

As calmly as she could, she opened the door and slipped into the room with a smile and a gentle, "Good morning," He was staring at her with what she could now confirm were indeed bright blue eyes, though full of confusion. She forced herself to look away by glancing casually at her watch, "Or should I say afternoon?"

He looked tense, and she was worried that maybe he wasn't mentally recovered after all. But then he asked with a edge of suspicion, "Where am I?"

Oh good, he could speak. And to hear the voice of her hero at last - not in an old film but actually there, speaking to her! She couldn't have been more honored if General Patton, himself, was talking to her; but the tone of his voice almost made her smile falter.

She tried to keep playing it cool, "You're in a recovery room in New York City."

Well, it wasn't a lie, but the look on his face said he didn't believe her. His eyes darted from her to the window to the radio and back to her as he lowered his eyebrows a bit.

"Where am I, really?"

What if something _had_ been messed up in his brain? He looked like a cornered animal, and if he suddenly got aggressive with her, she knew enough about him to realize she'd probably lose that fight.

Suppressing her nervousness with a little laugh and another smile, she innocently replied, "I'm afraid I don't understand."

"The game," he stared at her, studying her reaction, "It's from May, 1941. I know because I was there."

Damn. Cate's smile completely faded as she tried to delay thoughts of wringing the night nurse's neck and come up with a believable explanation instead. Did they have reruns in the 40s? But it was too late for any kind of excuse, she realized as she watched him slowly stand up. Noting his height for the first time, she suddenly felt about as agitated as he looked - and he looked like he was about to explode. Great, this was definitely going to get physical. She slipped a silent alarm remote out of her sleeve and into her palm, just in case.

Stepping closer and closer to her, even his voice grew more intimidating, "Now I'm going to ask you again, where am I?"

She didn't hesitate any longer and pressed the button in frustration. She had hoped for a smooth and happy awakening, but now he was all up on her, threatening her? After all she'd done for him?! The response to her silent alarm would be swift, but she wanted to give him one last chance to behave himself.

"Captain Rogers…" she started.

"Who are you?!" he demanded, beginning to step even closer to her before Cate heard the door behind her open to many booted footsteps.

The super soldier finally flinched back defensively, sharp gaze darting over the newcomers to assess his situation. Cate realized they would be in standard tactical S.H.I.E.L.D. security gear, and not in her carefully-crafted time capsule clothing. Well, there was her cover completely blown and she could see it clearly in the Captain's eyes, which had gone from angry suspicion to frightened panic. It was down to fight or flight and he chose both.

Cate stepped back to cover the exit door while the security team moved forward to subdue the subject. None of the files or documentaries had quite done this man justice, she thought in awe as she watched him throw the first guard aside with ease and jump over the top of another. If he ran for the door, she was definitely going to move, she decided; but he avoided that direction all together and instead tossed two of the guards straight through the wall, knocking open a giant hole for him to run through. This was bad. If he got loose in this base, it would definitely blow his mind. This was not how this assignment was supposed to go!

"Captain Rogers, wait!" Cate called, awkwardly trying to climb through the hole after him in her impossible pencil skirt and heels. Unable to pursue as he burst through the double doors into the main facility, she pulled out her comm and announced, "All agents, code thirteen. I repeat: all agents, code thirteen."

Her colleagues would be on him in no time, but she kicked off her heels and shuffled as quickly as her skirt would allow, following the fugitive's path of destruction through the lobby and out onto the sidewalk toward Times Square. In the distance, she could see a fleet of SUVs and agents holding back curious onlookers. She flashed her badge to pass the blockade line and finally spotted her target standing in the middle of the ring of commotion, talking to her director. Of all the bad luck! Why did Fury have to be at the base just in time for this monumental mission failure?! At least Captain Rogers looked calmed down now, if a little overwhelmed.

"Ah, Agent Mills," Fury greeted condescendingly when she finally reached them, "Excellent work."

"Sorry, sir," she clenched her teeth, "We didn't realize he'd be so sharp straight out of a coma."

"Look, Captain," the director got Rogers's attention, "I can't do anything about your date, but I do have Agent Mills here, who you'll be getting to know really well from now on. Do it over dinner for all I care."

"Date, what?" Cate looked at Fury in confusion.

"Get him up to speed, Mills," he started walking away, "And try not to scare him off again. We can't afford another code thirteen."

Cate bit her lip and tried to suppress her frustrated blush. She suddenly felt terribly embarrassed being the only one standing out there in an old-fashioned costume. Well, not the _only_ one… The Captain was completely deflated now, all the fear and aggression gone out of him. His tired eyes were fixed on her like she was the only familiar thing in a sea of confusion, and she realized the purpose of her assignment was still intact after all.

"Sorry about before," she offered a comforting smile, "It's a bit more overwhelming now than I intended it to be, but it'll be alright. I'll take care of you."

**Author's note: the adventures of Steve and Cate to follow in an eventual side story


	3. Chapter 3

_ A few months later_…

The tracing program was a bit above Cate's technical level, especially after living like such a luddite for the past few months for Steve's sake, but she was determined to wrap her head around the commands. A friend's life depended on it. She rubbed her eyes and looked away from the monitor to give them a break, noticing just as Natasha wandered into the helicarrier's bridge area.

"Nat!" Cate jumped up from her terminal and trotted over for a vigorous reunion hug with her teammate.

There were no words to express the weight of the situation, but they both understood it well. Cate had been blissfully enjoying the most relaxing assignment of her life when she got the news that the world had fallen apart - the Mojave facility destroyed, the power source that Steve had fought so hard to keep out of the wrong hands now taken by some psycho alien overlord, and Clint compromised. Although it was nowhere near ready, Fury had no choice but to activate the Avengers Initiative, even if it meant taking a second look at the failed assessments. Cate had cleared Captain Rogers for inclusion within a week of his waking and had quickly gone from roommate to more of a coach, therapist, and friend to the recovering soldier while he contemplated whether he even wanted to join the team or not. They'd barely been apart over the last few months, but with so much on the line, she had to leave him when Fury called her in to prep the helicarrier for the team's first operation. Natasha had also been pulled out of the middle of an assignment and sent to recruit one of the other candidates while Phil paid Stark a personal visit to invite him back in out of the reject pile.

"Where's the big guy?" Natasha looked around.

"Huh?" Cate tilted her head, "Oh, Captain Rogers? Just wait 'til he gets here, you're going to love him. I was already here before Fury delivered the invitation to him personally, then Coulson offered to pick him up from New York after visiting Stark. Poor Phil's been so busy with all his projects, it's about time he finally met Steve. I figured I'd give them some alone time for the flight over." They both smiled at this, then Cate looked around too, "Where's the...bigger guy?"

She smirked, "Bruce wanted to get his sea legs, so he's wandering around the deck for a bit. It's not that he makes me nervous, but I think I'll wait until it's absolutely necessary to break the news to him. He's really not so bad, though; you'll like him. Any word on Stark?"

"Coulson dropped off the packet with him last night," Cate shrugged, "No contact since then. What do _you_ think?"

Natasha scowled into the distance as she thought about it, "If there's trouble, I doubt he'll be able to stay out of it. Don't be surprised if he shows up just to be a nuisance. Coulson is sure going to have his hands full with this bunch."

"Well, unfortunately it sounds like desperate measures are the name of the game now if we want to stop this Loki guy and get Clint back," Cate paused a moment as they both sobered up at the sound of his name, then she nodded toward her terminal, "This face-trace program is borderline unethical; but once it's up and running, we stand a pretty good chance of tracking them down...eventually."

They were about to head over to the computer for a quick demo when Director Fury marched out into his central platform and pointed at them, "Mills, Romanoff! Agent Coulson's jet will be arriving momentarily. Go tell him to come up to the bridge - we're ready to begin the face-trace."

The ladies glanced at each other, then Natasha frowned, "Why don't you just call him on comms?"

"Because, Agent Romanoff, he's with a V.I.P.," Fury explained slowly, "And a greeting committee is more personal than comms. Now get down there while Agent Mills preps the lab."

They both shuffled out into the hallway where Cate huffed, "Prep the lab? I'm not custodial! I'm sure the techs have the lab all set up just fine."

"Just give it a once-over, I guess," Natasha shrugged, "Want me to bring your boy back up with me?"

"If you don't mind," she smiled gratefully, "The elevators on this rig might be a little complicated for him."

They split off to tackle their separate assignments and Cate was annoyed to find that there was pretty much nothing left to do in the lab. Everything seemed to be clean and in its proper place, though if any of the scientific equipment needed tweaking, a field agent like her wouldn't be able to recognize it. She was walking around booting up all the computers and testing the touch screens when she realized someone else had joined her in the lab. Having not heard the door open, she nearly jumped when she spotted him out of the corner of her eye. Oddly enough, he seemed to notice her at the same time and froze, as though he also thought he had been alone in the room. Cate scrutinized the young man's completely average face and bland tech uniform. She didn't recognize him - not that she would ever know any of the regular staff - but she clearly outranked him, so she stood up a little straighter and flicked her questioning gaze down to the metal struts he was carrying.

"Can I help you?"

"This is Dr. Banner's lab, is it not?" he asked cooly with a bit of a British accent.

"It is," she folded her arms, "Was additional hardware ordered?"

"Of course," he finally moved to carry on with his task as he answered, "You are anticipating the retrieval of artifacts that will require some study, no doubt."

"That's the plan," she said simply and continued to watch him.

There was some kind of attitude to him that seemed inappropriate for a tech, and she had half a mind to speak to the science division coordinator about it. But no more words were exchanged as he worked quietly, setting up the struts on a metal table near the bay window wall. Unable to shake the uneasy feeling, Cate tried to distract herself by returning to her own tasks. When she heard the door open a few minutes later, she looked over and saw the tech paused on his way out.

He gave her an odd sort of smile and said, "Good luck, agent."

"Thanks…" she watched the door close behind him, then looked back to where he had been working.

The struts seemed to be adequately installed to support a displayed item, but she thought they were much too far apart to hold the Tesseract. From what she'd seen, the cube was small enough to fit in one hand, yet the struts were separated by at least a couple feet. She rolled her eyes at the obvious error and marched to the door to call the tech back to fix the job. As she looked down the hallway in both directions, though, it was completely empty. How had he run off so fast?

At that moment, the alarm lights started flashing white to indicate takeoff and she felt the vibration of the hover engines kicking in. She braced herself with one hand against the wall for stability during the initial liftoff out of the water, which was always the shakiest part, and was just about to head back into the lab when she spotted Agent Coulson rounding the corner at the end of the hallway. They both brightened at the sight of each other and she trotted down to meet him halfway.

"Good to see you again, sir!" she couldn't help but smile broadly as she pulled him from a vigorous handshake into a quick hug, "How was the flight?"

He just grinned and chuckled modestly, "Captain Rogers seems very well-adjusted now compared to what I saw on that initial footage. Good work, agent."

"It's been an honor," she assured him, "And he'll be a great addition to your team."

"Thanks to you," his face shifted to a slightly more serious look, "And that's why I'm taking the Avengers Initiative project away from you…"

"What-?!"

"And adding you _to_ it."

They stared at each other for a quiet moment and she shook her head, "I don't understand. The Initiative is for exceptionally powerful candidates."

"And you've studied up on all the ones we're dealing with," he gave her a knowing look, "I've got other projects to coordinate too and I'd rather have a few of my top agents embedded in this team to give it an element of organization. I don't doubt the Captain's ability to lead them, but I want you in there at his side, like you have been from the beginning. I'm adding you and Agent Romanoff and Agent Barton, when we get him back - and we will."

Nearly overcome with emotion, she bit her lip to hold it back, "Thank you, sir. Thank you so much."

He patted her arm and broke into a fatherly smile, "The crew is taking up a container from the quinjet to your quarters. It's got a few specially-designed combat suits for the new team members. Can you distribute them for me?"

"Absolutely I can," she straightened up, "You know I'm a huge fan of your designs."

He looked around for a second to make sure nobody was listening, "And would you let me know what Rogers thinks of his? I really hope he likes it."

"I'm sure he will," she waved him off, "I've already got Steve's set up in his room and I think I it looks spectacular. He must know what a big fan you are by now. Did he sign your cards?"

"I didn't ask," he admitted bashfully, "It just seemed a little over the line."

"Are you kidding, Phil?" she slapped his arm, "I worked hard to find you those rare ones! You better get them signed. He wouldn't mind at all, I'm telling you right now."

"All right, all right, I'll ask," he surrendered and started moving away, "Gotta check out the director's new program first."

"All right. See you on the bridge," she waved and smirked at his little salute while hurrying away.

Nearly giddy with the possibilities of her new assignment, Cate returned to the lab and slowly finished checking the setup between daydreams. With Dr. Banner's help, they'd recover Clint for sure and then she'd be back in the field with him and Natasha. On top of that, she'd still get to work with Steve. What a great team they'd all make! Maybe Stark wouldn't show up at all and things would be perfect. Then there were the wild card candidates in the Avengers Initiative files - the ones who weren't even on this planet. Would she ever get to work with them? She was still smiling with excitement when Natasha showed up with a familiar face in tow.

Raising an eyebrow at her colleague's expression, Natasha gestured, "...and this is Agent Mills."

Cate tried to get her smile under control and held out her hand, "Dr. Banner, your file is quite impressive. Welcome to the team. Your lab is all set up, but if you need anything else just let a tech know."

"Thanks," he said hesitatingly and let go of her hand so that he could lay his coat over the back of a nearby chair, "I'll just familiarize myself with the equipment, if you don't mind."

"Yeah, go ahead," Cate waited until he was far enough away then whispered to Natasha, "He's shorter than I thought he'd be. Very deceptive."

Natasha elbowed her, "At least that stat was in his file. Whereas I had no warning that you dress Rogers like a grandpa."

"Oh no," Cate groaned, "Does he have on a button-up shirt tucked in to his pants?"

"Pleated slacks, even."

"With loafers?"

"You know it."

Cate took a deep breath, "Well, he was on his own for a few days. There's nothing I could do. Where is he now?"

"I left him on the bridge," she tossed her head in that general direction, "They've started the face-trace and Dr. Banner here seems to have a plan to help speed things up."

"Love it," Cate nodded, "And did Coulson tell you the news?"

"No, what's the news?"

"He's adding us to the Initiative," Cate explained over Natasha's astonished look, "We're heading out with the team for this mission. Combat suits are in my room."

Natasha indulged in a satisfied smile, "We're going to get Clint back for sure."

"Just gotta find him first," Cate offered a thumbs up towards Dr. Banner, who was alternating his attention between the two agents and a computer screen.

"Uh, I could use an extra pair of eyes, if it's not too much trouble," he finally spoke up.

They both stepped forward immediately as Natasha replied, "Just tell us what to do."

Between the three of them, it took less than an hour to get all the displays up and running as results from spectrometers around the world came in and cross referenced with each other to create a Tesseract-tracking map. Cate looked from screen to screen and blinked uncomfortably at the amount of strong gamma readings that apparently existed across the planet. At least it was narrowing down the hotspots for their face-trace program to focus on.

"Well," she sighed, "I guess I'll go do what I can from my terminal. You staying here, Agent Romanoff?"

"Yeah, I'll make sure everything keeps running smoothly for the doctor," she touched her ear to indicate that she'd still be reachable by comm if anything came up.

Cate made her way back to the bridge, but slowed once she got inside the doors and heard Agent Sitwell announce, "We got a hit! Sixty-seven percent match...wait, cross-match...seventy-nine percent."

From where he had been standing nearby with Steve, Coulson marched forward to look at the screens, "Location?"

"Stuttgart, Germany," Sitwell read off, "Twenty-eight Konigstrasse. He's not exactly hiding."

"Konigstrasse?" Cate muttered to herself, sorting out the translation with a roll of her eyes, "Oh, King Street. That figures."

It really was too obvious, but maybe he was just that cocky or underestimated them that much. Either way, he was in their crosshairs now and she had to hold back her excitement. This was finally it! S.H.I.E.L.D. was going to save the world and she was going to be part of the team to do it.

"Captain," Fury called and as Steve turned, his eyes slipped past the director and spotted Cate at the door, "You're up."

She nodded encouragingly and he took a deep breath and nodded back, walking immediately towards her. Fury turned to figure out what had drawn the soldier's attention and saw Cate standing by.

"Oh, good, Agent Mills," he greeted, "Get the Captain and his team ready for departure."

"Yes, sir," she looked towards Coulson for additional instructions.

"I'll be coordinating from here," he nodded at her, "Mission packet will be sent to your jet. Go get your team suited up and airborne."

"Copy that," it was all she could do not to smile at this directive and the presence of Steve arriving at her side, "Captain Rogers, follow me."

"Yes, ma'am."

As soon as they were far enough down the hallway, Cate paused and threw her arms around him for a quick hug which he returned with the same nervous stiffness as always, "How are you feeling, Steve? I know it's a lot all of a sudden." She touched his cheek to turn his face towards her and squinted at him, "You're still having trouble sleeping?"

"Well, yeah, you know how my mind gets restless," he frowned, "But it's like you said, maybe I just need to get back in action. This does feel like the right decision."

"I'm so glad you said yes," she gave him a proud smile, "Now let's get you out of those church clothes and into something more appropriate for fighting aliens."

"Oh, come on, Cate," he sighed, "It's my first big mission with the new team, I wanted to look nice. Besides, I didn't button my shirt all the way to the top this time."

"Yeah, you look super-casual with your neck all showing like that," she rolled her eyes as she turned to continue leading the way, "Doesn't matter now, though. I've got a big surprise for you."

"And just when I was starting to think I couldn't be surprised anymore," he remarked and they both smiled.

Cate held a finger up to her ear and walked backwards for a bit while she explained, "I'm going to talk out loud in a second, okay? But I'm not talking to you, it's a private feed between me and Agent Romanoff. When we're on missions, we're going to use comms like this - direct connections to talk to each other. You'll get used to it, don't worry."

He nodded.

"Hey, Nat," Cate opened up their channel and pressed her lips together when it looked like Steve was trying to listen for a response as well, despite her explanation.

"Find something?" Natasha cut straight to the chase.

"Got a positive ID on Loki in Germany. Thank the doctor for us, then head to my room for your gear."

"Meet you there."


	4. Chapter 4

With energy running high now, they were all three in Cate's quarters in no time and watching eagerly as she opened the crate that had arrived from Coulson's jet. The first thing she pulled out was a bag of accessories and a tiny all-black jumpsuit with a S.H.I.E.L.D. badge on each arm, "This must be yours, Nat. Oh, and there's mine!"

"Not bad," Natasha inspected her uniform appreciatively.

"Wait, you're suiting up too?" Steve finally caught on.

"Yeah," Cate felt her heart swell as she lifted a long dark blue jumpsuit with the S.H.I.E.L.D. logo on the back and red and silver accents that complimented the Captain's uniform quite nicely, "We're not just here for support anymore, Steve. We're teammates."

"You weren't in the files…"

"Surprise!" she wiggled her fingers then pointed, "Steve, your room is connected to mine through that door, just like home. Open the back wall panel and you'll find your new suit too. Now, let's all get dressed and down to the quinjet STAT."

There was one last outfit in the bin and it had very distinct S.H.I.E.L.D. badge on one corner of the chest, obviously intended for the missing agent. Cate decided she would move it to Clint's room when they got back. As soon as everyone had cleared out of her room, Cate rushed to change into her suit and admired in the mirror how it was cut with flattering lines and a conservative high neck. She posed confidently in front of her reflection and snapped a picture which she immediately sent to Coulson with the text: "You've outdone yourself. Nat loved hers too."

She could almost picture his grin in the smiley face emoji accompanying his response, "Can't wait to see them in action."

There was a knock on the door and she put the phone away and called, "Come in."

Steve poked his head in first to make sure it was truly safe, then the rest of him followed, brightening the room with his bold costume and shiny shield. It was a nostalgic cobalt blue suit with red and white stripes across the middle and silver accents, including a star on the chest. For a moment, Cate was filled with that same nervous awe as the first time she'd laid eyes on him in the thawing pod. This was Captain America, straight out of her posters and now living, breathing, and standing right in front of her

"Wow," she breathed, gesturing broadly at him, "What do you think?"

He had that distant look on his face that Cate recognized from many sleepless nights that he spent pacing around the living room or wailing away on a punching bag downstairs. It seemed they were both having a moment.

"Hey, Steve," she ventured, "You gonna be okay?"

"Yeah," he said softly at first, then seemed to focus and put a little resolve into his voice, "Yeah, I've got a job to do."

"We all do," Cate beamed in approval, then held out her arms and struck a pose.

He looked her up and down, venturing a smile, "Are you supposed to be my sidekick?"

"Sidekick?!" she sputtered, "I'll side kick you back into the iceberg you came from, Rogers! I just happen to like red, white, and blue also."

Natasha finally entered with folded arms, looking as curvy and dark as ever, "Not much for stealth, are you two? When do you break out the sparklers?"

"After the barbeque, but before the bald eagle flyover," Cate answered without missing a beat, then opened a small case on her desk and reached over Steve's shoulder to grab his ear, "Hold still, this is just your earpiece. Don't take it out." Then she handed him a tiny cap, "And this is your mic. Fit it over your back tooth and bite down to activate. Once you're on comms, we should all be able to talk to each other during the action. Your hood will help filter the noise, so be sure to pull it on before engagement. My condolences to your perfectly-combed hair."

"Sacrifices must be made," Natasha nodded, "Now let's go kick some Asgardian ass."

Steve looked a bit shocked at such language coming from a lady, but Cate pushed him forward to follow the other agent as they all marched down to the hangar bay. On the way, Cate texted Coulson a glowing recount of Steve's reaction to his new suit. When they arrived in the bay, she led them towards her assigned quinjet and up into the cabin. Grabbing her cozy flight jacket off the back of the chair, she hopped into the pilot seat and pulled on her helmet, booting up all systems and scrolling through the mission packet Coulson had sent through, as promised. Natasha slid into the copilot seat and primed the weapon controls, both of them working together like a well-oiled machine until the jet was out of the bay and racing through the air towards Germany.

"You're really punching it, Mills," Coulson's voice hummed into her helmet, "Watch those turbo fuel levels."

"Babysitting has been lovely, but I'm eager to get back into the thick of things, sir," she smirked, "Am I going too fast for support to keep up?"

"You're not getting support on this one," he informed her, "Loki poses a global threat and you are the alpha team. If you can't stop him, there's no backup in all of S.H.I.E.L.D. that would stand a chance. I've seen this guy in action. Be careful."

"I know, I've read the files," she grew more serious, "Not a ton of info on him, though. Bolding the words 'extremely dangerous' does not equal great intel." She was quiet for a minute, then concluded, "Clint would have the best insight on him now."

"Retrieval of Agent Barton is secondary to capturing Loki, Agent Mills," Coulson said in a strict, yet regretful voice, "Do you understand? There are other teams that can hunt down a rogue operative."

Cate frowned, "Yes, sir. I understand."

She glanced at Natasha, but communication with mission control seemed to be restricted to her helmet comm for the moment and the co-pilot was wearing a patient expression that let Cate know she could wait until later for an explanation. They both had their work cut out for them in the cockpit anyway, as Cate was pushing the cutting-edge jet to the limits of its capabilities. If anyone cared enough to clock them, they were probably going to make it to Germany in record-setting time. Steve mostly hung out back in the open cabin bay familiarizing himself with the simpler control panels and emergency tools, but he wandered forward every once in a while to watch them work until all the flashing lights and scrolling info screens overwhelmed him.

They were rocketing over Europe, minutes from their target, when Coulson's voice buzzed into everyone's comms, "Team, we've got confirmation of a massive hostage situation at your target address. I need the Captain on the ground _now_."

"Copy that," Cate flipped on the stealth paneling activation - the last thing she wanted to do was be spotted a mile away and build up tension in a hostage situation.

"Captain," Natasha called over her shoulder, "You may want to activate your comm now."

A few seconds later they heard his hesitant voice in their earpieces, "Is this- is this thing working?"

"Reading you loud and clear, Cap," Natasha settled into her seat, hands hovering over the weapons controls.

"Opening bay door," Cate announced through their team channel as wind started to howl through the open cabin, "We'll be over the target in about 40 seconds. I'll bring us in as low as I can. Captain Rogers, you'll have to stick the landing and take it from there. We'll be your air support."

"Copy that," he replied.

She spared a glance over her shoulder at him and saw a completely different man than the one she'd been taking care of for the last few months. Suddenly he was standing up straighter, his eyes were focused and full of energy, his entire being radiated pure confidence and - dare she think it? - swagger. It was clear that he was born for this; back in the fight was where he was meant to be. Posing there at the edge of the open door with his shield gripped to his arm, she once again remembered that she was in the presence of a legend.

"Prepare to jump," she refocused on her part of this operation, "In 5...4...3...2...1!"

His grunt of effort burst into their earpieces as he hit the ground simultaneously with a flash of light from below. Desiring the intimidation factor of their presence now, Cate was already switching off the stealth paneling as she kicked the jet into a tight turn to come back around and down into a hovering position with prime situation visibility. Natasha reached up and deployed their lower gatling gun, so that it was clearly pointed toward the conflict.

"Loki," Natasha ordered through the jet's loudspeaker, "Drop the weapon and stand down."

She had barely finished saying this when Loki thrust his scepter forward and a blue light shot up toward the jet. Faster than a flinch, Cate's evasive reflexes had already turned the hovering fighter up onto one wing as the energy attack passed harmlessly through the space they had occupied fractions of a second earlier. There was an immediate blur of motion on the ground and by the time she'd tipped the nose of the jet back down to regain their view of the conflict, Captain Rogers was fully engaged in a fight with Loki.

Both she and Natasha leaned forward with interest as they watched the skirmish play out. Seeing Captain America in action was mesmerizing; though he seemed to have met a worthy adversary, because Loki was taking and dishing out hits far better than the Nazis in the old footage Cate had studied. She began to worry that Steve might be a little rusty or that this Asgardian was just way more out of their league than they had realized. At one point, the Captain took a hit that laid him out on the ground and before he could get completely to his feet again, Loki had the butt of his scepter against the back of Steve's head.

Cate felt a moment of panic and scanned her panel for any kind of precision weapon that might help, but nothing on this jet was safe to use when the target was so close to an ally. Luckily Steve jumped out of the prone position and the fight resumed.

"Nat," Cate glanced at her copilot, who also happened to have her fingers on the main weapons controls at the moment, "I'll find us an angle. You gotta take a shot at Loki as soon as Cap is clear."

Natasha was watching target zone just as intensely and pointed out in frustration, "Guy's all over the place."

Once again Steve was bested and tossed to the ground while the agents tensed over weapons they couldn't use. Seeing him sprawled on the pavement like that triggered a protective instinct in Cate that made her want to leave the jet in Natasha's hands and jump down into the fight, herself. Logically if Loki was stronger than Steve, then she didn't really stand a chance; but maybe two-on-one would be distracting enough to give her side an edge. Anything had to be better than sitting helplessly up here watching Steve get thrown around like this.

"Mills, you've got inc-" Coulson started to say through her helmet before there was a short burst of static and a new speaker cut in.

"Agent Romanoff," the voice said into all their comms, "You miss me?"

Cate scowled as the screens on her control panel started to go haywire and a warning box displayed "PA SYSTEM OVERRIDE" while both the entire comm system and their loudspeaker blasted AC/DC. Natasha didn't look quite as shocked as Cate, though a bit impatient as she turned her eyes upward and spotted the glow of rocket boosters guiding the newcomer toward their position. The two adversaries on the ground had stopped fighting in their confusion and before the new figure had even touched down, he knocked Loki backwards with a blast from his hands. The armored suit hit the ground in some sort of well-rehearsed landing pose and everyone could finally see clearly enough to recognize the unexpected guest.

"Is that Iron Man?" Cate groaned, finally getting the PA system back under her control.

Natasha almost smiled, "I guess he decided to join after all. Just in time, it would seem."

"Lucky us."

Cate noticed that Steve was on his feet at last and had joined Iron Man in standing over a defeated Loki. The villain raised his arms in surrender and a sort of magic shimmered over his body, transforming his outfit for some reason. Really? So two-on-one had worked? She should have jumped out to help when she first thought of it!

"Mission control, we have the target in custody and will be transporting him back to you shortly," Natasha announced as Cate maneuvered the quinjet slowly down into the square where the two men stood guard over their prisoner.

As soon as the craft set down, Cate was out of her seat, "I'll help them wrap him up, Nat. You run a scan of the area and see if there's any trace of Clint or the Tesseract before we leave."

"You got it," Natasha's fingers were already flying over the controls.

Cate grabbed one of the special set of handcuffs they'd brought and hurried down the ramp toward the scene of the surrender. Everyone turned to watch her approach and she decided she wanted to be able to glare at Loki eye-to-eye as she cuffed him, so she pulled her helmet off, tossing her hair free out of habit. Suddenly the Iron Man helmet retracted and she recognized Tony Stark's well-publicized face, though she'd never seen any picture of him with an expression like that.

His eyes moved up and down her a couple times then settled on the handcuffs swinging from her fist, "Aww, for me? You shouldn't have."

Steve looked at him in genuine confusion, "Why would-"

"Thank you for your assistance, Mr. Stark," Cate interrupted before Steve could think about it too much, "We'll take it from here."

"You think so?" Stark tilted his head towards Steve, "Because it looked like your boy here was having trouble. If you're transporting E.T., I think we'd all feel better if I took over as your escort, Red."

"That's Agent Mills to you, Stark," Steve snapped, "She's a teammate, so try to show a little respect."

"Teammate? Like part of the Avengers Initiative?" he sounded surprised, "I didn't get a file on her. Mills, when do I get your file?"

As the two men continued to bicker, Cate squatted down in front of the sitting villain and held up the cuffs, "Don't try anything funny, Loki."

"Wouldn't dream of it," he lifted his arms toward her and they locked eyes.

There was something unnerving about his gaze and Cate got the overwhelming feeling that this was wrong. He didn't look defeated at all, yet there he was in a position of surrender. She should be the one in control here, but no matter how much strength she put into her glare, she still felt like the weaker being. One thing she did know from his file was that he could create illusionary copies of himself, so her first suspicion was that this wasn't really him. With a hesitant motion, she grabbed his wrist, cursing herself for her trepidation, but she'd never actually felt an alien before. He was cooler to the touch than she expected, but solid, sure enough; so she quickly finished cuffing him and hauled him to his feet. Glancing around, she found herself in the unusual position of being the shortest person in a group.

"I'll take him, Agent Mills," Steve offered and she handed him the guiding grip between the cuffs.

As he headed back toward the jet, Cate picked up her helmet and looked at their new ally, "If you're truly on the team now, Mr. Stark, you can go ahead and follow me back to home base."

"Wow, straight to home base, huh? You move fast, Agent America," he teased until becoming distracted and bending down to pick up Loki's discarded scepter, "Hello, there. This could be interesting."

"We have special facilities for weapons like that," Cate warned him, "I'll have a S.H.I.E.L.D. cleanup team retrieve it."

"Or…" he turned it over in his hand, "I'll take it back to base right now and have a look at it, myself."

"Whatever," she started up the ramp, "Just don't drop it along the way."

"Oh no, I'm riding with you," he followed her up.

"You have a flying suit."

"And you have a few things on this jet I'd like to keep an eye on."

She pushed the button to close the ramp behind them and sighed, "Fine. Just don't antagonize the prisoner...or your teammates." Then she called up to the front of the craft, "Agent Romanoff, any trace of our secondary targets?"

"Nothing," Natasha shook her head.

Cate paused next to where Loki was being secured to a seat and glared down at him, "You didn't come all the way to earth, kill eighty of my colleagues, and steal the Tesseract just so that you could wander off alone to harass some German aristocrats. Tell us where your hiding the cube and all your brainwashed henchmen."

He simply stared back up at her with an infuriatingly calm smile, but didn't say anything.

She definitely felt like something was wrong now and exchanged a look with Steve, who seemed to be thinking the same thing. Before either one could push the issue, Stark nudged Cate forward.

"No antagonizing the prisoner," he reminded her, "Let's just hurry up and get him back to whatever padded cell your director's got cooked up."

Cate huffed in annoyance as she pulled her helmet on and marched up to the pilot's seat.

"Great line of questioning," Natasha nodded in mock seriousness, "Very direct."

"Shut up," Cate set to work getting the jet lifted off, "I'm not the interrogation expert, like _someone _\- ah, shoot…" she noticed one of the gauges, "I used up most of the turbo fuel getting over here. It's going to have to be subsonic speeds all the way back."

"Set our course and give me an ETA," Natasha adjusted some systems from her copilot panels, "Then I'll update mission control."


	5. Chapter 5

Within a few minutes, they were up to speed and cruising low over the moonlit landscape. Cate's computer had just recalculated the most efficient route back to the helicarrier's ever-changing location and she was about to read off the ETA, when the cockpit area was invaded by giant shiny red visitor.

"Hey, Agent Romanoff," Stark bent over the center console toward the copilot seat so that Cate had to lean away from his iron backside, "New haircut? It's nice." When Natasha nodded without looking at him, he turned to face Cate instead and she leaned even further away from the new eyeline, "So what kind of entertainment you got on this thing?"

"Mr. Stark, please let the ladies do their jobs," Steve called with an edge of impatience.

He turned with a tight smile and ducked back through the threshold into the cabin, "What's the matter? His highness not keeping you good company back here?"

Everyone took a moment to glance back at Loki, then Cate breathed a silent sigh of relief as Steve planted himself defensively in the entryway behind her seat. Her attention redirected to a screen suddenly showing an unusual spike in electromagnetic readings. There could be any number of reasons for this, but none of them were good for her instruments.

"Agent Romanoff, go ahead and inform them that we should arrive by twenty-one hundred," she instructed as she busied herself scanning the weather radar to make sure she wasn't flying into some kind of storm.

"Mission control," Natasha's voice crackled through all their comms, "We estimate arrival time of twenty-one hundred. Please have security escort standing by for prisoner transport."

"Copy that, agent," Coulson replied, "The director wants to have a word."

"Does he have the cube?" Fury broke in immediately.

"No, sir," Natasha answered, "He was alone and empty-handed when we apprehended him."

"Is he saying anything?"

"Not a word."

"Just get him here," the director sounded annoyed now, "We're low on time."

Natasha reached over and pointedly clicked the channel off. Fury had a way of turning a victory into a feeling that you hadn't quite done enough, and now everyone sensed the weight of it. Behind her, Cate could hear the boys reignite their bickering, though in considerate low voices this time; but her focus was between the mounting issues with her screens and scanning through the window to see what could be causing them. Suddenly a fork of lightning stabbed down from the relatively clear sky, nearly killing her night vision if it weren't for the quick adapting of her helmet's visor. It was followed in immediate succession by an unending cascade of bolt after bolt, requiring Cate to grab the controls with both hands and shift all her concentration to steering the jet safely between the unpredictable tendrils of electricity.

"Where is this coming from?" Natasha looked around out the window in equal confusion.

As the storm intensified, Cate started to worry that Loki might be causing it. Lightning powers hadn't been noted in his file, but it was heavily featured in his brother's, so perhaps it ran in the family. Well, if he thought he could take them down that easily, then he definitely underestimated her flying skills. She juked them away from a particularly close call that sent a vibration through the jet and she heard everyone in the cabin shuffle nervously.

"What's the matter?" Steve called loud enough to be heard in the back, "Scared of a little lightning?"

Cate tensed. If Loki was visibly scared too, then he must not be the one doing it.

"I'm not overly fond of what follows," he answered, more annoyed than nervous.

The pilot and copilot exchanged concerned looks, not sure what it was that they should be expecting next. Outside, the sky had filled up with thick clouds, reducing visibility to zero and masking which direction the lightning might be coming from at any given moment. Instruments were going haywire, and it was all Cate could do to keep the jet from getting roasted or smashing into the side of an unseen mountain.

Suddenly the whole craft dipped and jolted with impact, and she heard everyone behind her burst into motion. For the first split second, she thought she'd hit a mountain after all, but then her instincts caught up and she knew that didn't match the feeling of the blow they'd just taken. Plus, they were still flying; though she was now fighting the controls against a sense of extra weight and loss of aerodynamicness. She could feel as Natasha engaged her own flight stick to help Cate steady the ship. As if that wasn't enough chaos to deal with, she had to clench her teeth against the sudden depressurization of the cabin as someone hit the bay door release in the back.

"What are you doing?" Steve yelled over the resulting wind.

All at once, the external issues from the impact seemed to solve themselves, and Cate adjusted to compensate for the drag now coming from the open door. Keeping her eyes on the flashing cloudscape, she saw Natasha in her peripheral turn to see what was going on behind them as the metallic blows of a scuffle rang out. Someone hit the ground behind the pilot's chair, but she dared not get distracted now that her copilot was no longer focused on sharing the controls.

"Now there's _that_ guy," Stark's voice complained through the speaker that indicated he was now wearing the Iron Man mask.

Still turned around, Natasha yelled, "Another Asgardian?"

"That guy's a friendly?" Steve shouted in disbelief.

"Doesn't matter," their armored teammate sounded uncharacteristically serious, "If he frees Loki or kills him, the Tesseract's lost."

"Stark!" Steve tried, "We need a plan of attack!"

"I have a plan: attack," came Iron Man's answer before the burst of rockets engaging.

It was quiet for a few seconds as Natasha rebooted a couple fried monitors and looked back over her shoulder, "I'd sit this one out, Cap."

"I don't see how I can," he sounded like a man with a purpose.

"These guys come from legend," she warned, "They're basically gods."

"There's only one God, ma'am, and I'm pretty sure He doesn't dress like that."

Despite the turbulence and raging electrical storm, Cate broke her focus for a moment to spare a smile. Just when she was starting to think he'd become all-soldier, Steve would just be Steve again.

Natasha faced forward with a long sigh, "This is going well..."

"Did he jump?" Cate suddenly realized why Steve was no longer talking.

"Yep, it's just us up here now."

"Is he crazy?! Even _I_ don't know what altitude we're at right now!"

"Well, he-" Natasha started, but went silent as the thunder and lightning around them ceased just as quickly as it had appeared.

As the clouds started to fade away with a similarly unnatural speed, Cate relaxed her grip on the controls and started punching buttons on the dash, "Help me get the instruments back online. We're going after our team."

"It's miles of dark wilderness down there; they could have landed anywhere," Natasha said as she worked, "Switching on thermal scan. Did you see the new guy?"

Cate shook her head, "I was a little focused on keeping us alive. You said it was another Asgardian. One of the ones from our files?"

"Pretty sure. It looked like Thor."

"That would explain the lightning," she cast one last suspicious glare at the calm sky then turned her attention to the thermal radar screen, "Looks like they're about a mile back - closing in on each other. This should be fun."

Circling the jet around, Cate descended toward the heat signatures, all of which were in motion, except one - a particularly weak one. She frowned at the isolation of the cooler signature and steered toward that one.

"Stark may be a bonehead but he was right when he said we can't lose Loki," she growled as a distant part of the forest lit up with energy attacks, "Then what does he do? Forgets about Loki to go get in a pissing match with the other boys."

"And you think that you and I are going to recapture Loki without him?" Natasha asked doubtfully, though she was already unbuckling, "You saw how Cap got tossed around. Do you think bullets would even work?"

"Take his staff," Cate motioned behind her, "It's tucked away back there somewhere and we know that it's got a doozy of a shot."

"A _doozy_?" she repeated, "How long have you been living with Rogers again?"

"Golly, Nat, don't bust my chops."

The agent groaned as she finally pulled out the staff, "I don't know how to use this thing. There isn't even a trigger."

"He doesn't know that," Cate shrugged and flipped on the stealth paneling, "Just act like you do. I'll be on top of him in 300 yards. Deer in the headlights?"

"Sure, why not?" Natasha agreed and stepped off the edge of the ramp, dropping into the darkness of the open air.

Cate slid the jet around, narrowly avoiding a sudden pillar of lightning from the adjacent valley, and spun in backwards so that she came to a hovering stop facing the rocky peak where the thermal readout indicated her target was. The forest at the base of the cliff was illuminated by electric attacks for a moment until she saw the receding rocket fires of Iron Man flying away toward a distant mountainside; and, according to the radar, he was taking another heat signature with him. Still, the one in front of her remained, so she deactivated her stealth panels and flicked on the spotlight beam straight into the eyes of her unsuspecting prey. To her surprise, Loki was lounging on the edge of the cliff as though he had been casually watching the others fight below rather than trying to make his own escape. Well, too bad he'd been distracted before because he'd just lost his chance to run now that the light was trained directly on him. As he shaded his face with his hands and flinched away from the blinding beam, Cate switched on the speaker as well.

"Up on your knees with your hands in the air!" she ordered loudly, counting on the noise and light to cover Natasha's stealthy approach from behind him.

Loki lifted both arms and climbed to his feet.

"I said _on your knees_!" Cate backed up the threat in her voice by deploying the ship's lower weapon turret and aiming it at him as well, though he probably couldn't see much through the light.

His squinting face relaxed into a defiant half-smile and he shook his head slowly.

"You want to test me, princess?" she warned, really tempted to wipe that smile off his face with a drum of bullets, "Because this gun is going to make Stark's shot feel like a kiss on the cheek. Now, I'm not going to tell you again…"

It was at this moment that Loki, thoroughly distracted by Cate's stalling, found himself at the pointy end of his own scepter as Natasha finally reached the scene and issued some fresh threats that Cate couldn't hear. Keeping the light and the gatling gun trained on the scene, she rotated the quinjet so that the bottom of the open ramp rested invitingly against the ground in front of Natasha and her prisoner, then she rolled out of her seat and sighted down her pistol to track their progress up into the cabin. Once Loki was forced down onto the bench, Cate moved closer to take the scepter and keep both weapons pointed at the villain while her colleague re-cuffed him and strapped him in securely. It was infuriating how unconcerned he seemed.

"You act as though I escaped alone," he said innocently.

"Oh, your brother's not off the hook either," Cate promised, "I'm getting really tired of you Asgardians just waltzing on over to my planet and messing stuff up."

Natasha stepped back from her completed task and took the scepter from Cate, returning it to the hold, "You know Coulson considers the other one worthy of inclusion in the Initiative," she raised an eyebrow at her fellow agent, "So try not to piss off a potential teammate."

"We've already got enough royalty with Stark on the team," Cate rolled her eyes, "If Thor's got the nerve to stick around after that jailbreak stunt, I'm going to give him a piece of my mind."

"Oh, I hope you do," Loki chuckled in genuine amusement and looked out the open hatchway hopefully.

"Loki, if you're suddenly feeling so chatty," Natasha folded her arms, "Why don't you tell us where the Tesseract is?"

Suddenly he clammed up with lips pressed together and chin lifted like a stubborn toddler, leaving them that much further from finding Clint. Cate wanted to wring his neck but, though he was restrained, she still didn't trust him enough to touch him again without one of the guys nearby.

Both ladies were back in the cockpit and preparing to lift off when Steve's voice broke into their earpieces, "Hey- um, hey...can you hear me?"

"Loud and clear, Captain," Natasha answered.

"We're - uh - we're all done here, so maybe you could pick us up. And also...we lost Loki."

"Lucky for you, we found him," Cate replied casually, "Heading to your twenty now."

Stark's voice jumped onto the channel, "Gotcha covered, doll. I'm sending your system our GPS pin."

"I already know where you are," she said through clenched teeth, "And I'd appreciate it if you kept your pins out of my system."

Natasha choked back a laugh as the comm feed went silent.

At last, he had a response, "Oh, well, you're going to love what I've done with your phone, then."

"My phone?! How would-" Cate resisted the urge to pull it out, "No, I don't have time for this."

"Oh, wow," Natasha leaned forward as they neared their destination, which looked like a disaster scene, "Did they do this?"

Cate swallowed nervously as she lowered the jet down into the center of acres of leveled forest. The three figures were sitting about as far apart as possible while still being in the same clearing, and whatever aggression they'd been brimming with before seemed to have been spent. Too bad, because she was still fired up about this monumental waste of time. As soon as the jet was on the ground and the ramp lowered, she stood up and yanked her helmet off, marching back to intercept the trio on their way in.

"Now listen here," she pointed a finger at Thor's chest, which compounded her annoyance by making her feel shorter than ever, "You can't just show up, lightning blazing, and steal away a vital prisoner that we captured first fair-and-square, assault my men, then slink back onto my ship like we're all on the same side," she tried to ignore the gleeful smile on Loki's face beside them, "You nearly _killed_ all of us up there!"

Thor nodded and fixed her with sincere eyes, "You are right, I was reckless. A greater danger than Loki faces your world, and I will be on your side until you have what you need from him and the threat has been vanquished. I never intended to put you or your people in danger, my lady. I am truly sorry."

"W-well, I...alright then," she stuttered, completely blindsided by his apology, "Just no more lightning on the jet."

Though she didn't look anybody else in the eye on her walk back up to the front, she could see that now Loki seemed disappointed, Steve seemed uncomfortable, and Stark seemed annoyed.

Only Natasha still had an amused smile when Cate rejoined her in the cockpit, "Boy, you really let him have it, all right."

Cate jammed her helmet on with a sigh, "Wasn't expecting that."


	6. Chapter 6

In no time, they were in the air again and zooming across the Atlantic. The quinjet finally rendezvoused with the helicarrier nearly an hour after their projected time. Coulson met them in the hangar with a squad of armored guards lined up behind him.

"Take him to the holding cell," he instructed the escort, pointing at Loki as they marched up the ramp, "Director Fury is waiting for him there." Once the prisoner was led away, his expression softened as he looked around at the rest of the jet, "Good work, team. And welcome aboard, Mr. Stark, Thor. Debriefing will take place on the bridge, if you'll follow Agent Romanoff and collect Dr. Banner on the way. Mr. Stark, the holding vault for your suit arrived and I'd be happy to show you to it. Agent Mills, would you like me to call ground crew over to take care of the post-flight check on your craft?"

"Thank you, Agent Coulson," the pilot shook her head, "But I prefer to do it myself. I'll join you on the bridge later."

Everyone split off for their destinations while Cate did a lap around her jet to check for damages. After braving a supernatural lightning storm, she couldn't help but feel a swell of pride at the lack of damage her ship had sustained. Other than a few fried circuits, she'd gotten them through pretty much unscathed. Once she put in her order with the crew for refueling, she slipped into the cockpit to throw her jacket back over her chair and turn off all the lights. A glow from the hold immediately caught her attention in the darkened cabin and she pulled out the confiscated scepter. If Stark wanted to study it so badly, why hadn't he taken it to the lab, himself? She sighed in resignation as she carried it down the ramp with her. Most likely, he had assistants for menial work like this; but just this once, she'd do him a favor and take it up to the lab for him. To her annoyance, though, the elevator she was riding in stopped on the storage level to admit Coulson and Stark, now in a suit and tie.

She scooted aside to let them in as she looked the billionaire up and down, "Is this really what you wear in that armor?"

He was unable to suppress his smile as he winked, "Wouldn't you like to find out?"

"I'd _like_ for you to be responsible for your own souvenirs," she tried to pass the scepter to him as they exited the elevator, but he dodged the handoff.

"Mmmm, how about you put that in the lab for me?" he smiled in what he probably thought was a sweet way.

"How about we all go?" Phil suggested, stepping ahead to lead the way.

Cate and Stark followed, turning small talk into banter the whole time. When they finally reached the lab, Cate was surprised to see that Dr. Banner had already been running tests on all kinds of other materials and making a general mess of the perfectly-organized tabletops.

"Not bad, I suppose," Stark looked around.

"The operating systems should be familiar to you," Phil explained, "And we've fit it with all the equipment that Dr. Banner thought he would need. Over here I've just restocked the hospitality basket. You've got granola, fruit, blueberries, peanut butter...you know, brain food. But let me know if there's something specific you'd like."

Cate wrinkled her nose at what she was overhearing and circled the opposite way to look for a place to set the scepter down. There wasn't much space left on the first couple tables, but when she got to the rear of the room, her gaze passed over the back table near the window and she froze. Those metal struts that the sketchy tech had set up earlier were still there, too far apart for the Tesseract she had hoped to bring back, but perfectly spaced to hold a scepter.

"Is there a security feed on Loki's cell?" she asked out loud.

"Yeah, sure," Phil moved to one of the computers, "Let me pull it up. Is something wrong?"

"Maybe," she stepped closer to the monitor as live video from the detention center filled the screen, and Stark and Phil came around to stand behind her and watch as well.

"How desperate am I?" Director Fury was saying, "You threaten my world with war, you steal a force you can't hope to control, you talk about peace, and you kill because it's fun. You have made me very desperate. You might not be glad that you did."

"Oooh," Loki, just on the other side of the glass from him, mocked, "It burns you to have come so close. To have the Tesseract, to have power - unlimited power. And for what?" He turned and looked directly at the camera, "A warm light for all mankind to share? And then to be reminded what real power is."

They stared each other down for a bit, then Fury smirked at Loki and walked away, "Well, let me know if real power wants a magazine or something."

After a few more uneventful seconds, Stark folded his arms, "He's a delight."

"Well, he _is_ our director, so what can we do?" Cate sighed, then tried to hide her pleased smile when Phil chuckled and Stark huffed out an amused breath.

"Loki looks pretty secure in there," Phil nodded at the screen then looked at Cate, "What's your concern, agent?"

"Either he's got a mole on this ship or powers that weren't elaborated on in his file," she looked back at the table, "But I don't think we should leave the scepter here. It's what he wants."

"Actually, it's what _I_ want," Stark argued, "Unless you've got a lab that's even better equipped to study it."

Cate frowned and tightened her grip on the weapon, but Phil tried to put her at ease, "We'll limit access to the lab. It would be a shame to lock it up in the armory. Alien tech like this is worth studying, especially when we've got minds like Mr. Stark and Dr. Banner on board. Just leave it here and let's get to the debriefing."

As the men started to walk away, Cate glared at Stark's victorious smirk and vented with a flourishy twirl of the scepter before laying it across the metal struts.

"How about that?" Stark remarked with an elbow to Phil's arm, "Don't you just love a girl who knows how to handle a staff?"

"Right," Phil led the way out into the hallway, "How _is_ Ms. Pott's DC trip going?"

This actually threw Stark off enough that he averted his eyes from the staredown he was having with Cate and she gave Phil a grateful pat on the back, "Agent Coulson, I'll join you all in a bit. I'm just going to grab some files from my room."

He nodded before Stark pulled his attention away with a redirection of the conversation, "Pepper's doing fine, but tell me about this cellist…"

As they continued on toward the bridge, Cate turned back to take the elevator to residential level. The open bin was gaping at her when she walked into her room and she felt her chest tighten when she saw the remaining uniform and accessories inside it. Before doing anything else, she scooped everything up and carried it down to Clint's room, arranging it in front of his closet so that it would be ready to go as soon as they brought him back. That depended on them getting Loki to reveal some information, though.

She pulled out her cell phone and finally noticed that her lockscreen wallpaper had been changed to a picture of Tony Stark from a recent magazine cover. She snorted in annoyance as she unlocked the phone and pulled up her chat with Natasha and typed, _I put Clint's suit in his room, now we just need the man. Loki knows. Compare notes in my room?_

Her reply was swift, _Debriefing was worthless. Be right up._

Cate changed her phone wallpaper back to its normal picture and had just started to scroll through her datapad files on Loki when her teammate entered.

"Tell me you've got a plan," Natasha marched in, "Because you usually do, and it's clear that nobody else does right now."

"Loki's cocky," Cate cut to the chase, "You heard him with the director...he's up to something and he's dying to taunt us about it. He just doesn't respond well to threats or displays of authority, like Fury was putting on."

"So what's your angle?" Natasha leaned over to look at the screen.

"From what we know about him, he wants to feel powerful. I'm sure you could pull off vulnerable while drawing him into believing that he's the one threatening you into it. He won't be able to resist dropping hints into those threats."

"I hate playing vulnerable," she groaned.

"Well, whatever you think will work then," Cate handed her the datapad, "You're the master interrogator."

"All right, just give me a bit to study up with your notes before I go in."

"Get as ready as you need," she stood, "I'll monitor from my terminal."

"Roger that," Natasha sat down on the edge of the bed and began reading.

Cate left her room and headed for the bridge, annoyed with herself for her clipped pace, but somehow it felt like somewhere a timer was counting down. As she hurried around one corner, she nearly ran into Steve, who had been hovering outside a door and peering at the code pad. He looked just as startled to see her.

"Cate!" he stepped back almost guiltily, "Where are you going?"

"...to the bridge," she looked at him suspiciously, then at the door, "Did you need help with something? I don't think I have clearance for this sector, though."

He worked his jaw thoughtfully for a second, then fixed her with a serious look, "Doesn't that bother you?"

"Not really," she frowned, "Security levels exist for a reason. I focus on my missions and let the agents in the higher levels focus on theirs."

"What if we're just being used for something we don't agree with, though?" he persisted, "You don't even know everything that your own agency is up to and yet you follow orders blindly?"

"S.H.I.E.L.D. is doing everything it can to protect innocent people from forces they can't fight themselves," she stiffened defensively, "And if that involves operations with clearance above mine, then it must be for the same purpose." She knew she shouldn't say it even before her mouth was moving, but it spilled out anyway, "Peggy designed it that way."

Using her against him was a low blow and she could see his eyes go cold immediately, "Bad people can corrupt things that were designed with the best intentions. Then they lie about it to cover their corruption."

Trying to contain her anger, Cate retorted, "We're not bad people, Steve. Yes, maybe S.H.I.E.L.D. keeps secrets to protect highly-sensitive projects, even from its own agents; but nobody's _lying_ to you."

"The first thing you ever _did_ was try to lie to me!" he burst.

She actually took a half step backwards with how hard that hit and had to look away. In the few seconds that it took for her to realize she had no response, Steve lost all his bluster and rubbed his eyes.

"I'm sorry," he muttered, "I know why you did it then and I'm not mad at you. It's just that Stark's got me thinking about what kind of secrets an organization like this could still be hiding."

Now that she knew the source of Steve's trouble, Cate's pain was quickly replaced with anger as she closed the distance between them again, "_Tony Stark_," she said his name with venom, "is looking for an angle to use S.H.I.E.L.D. as a way out of taking personal responsibility for whatever he's about to do. He's just a big man in a suit of armor that only cares about himself. He's not like us, Steve. When the tough call needs to be made, he's going to be the last one willing to sacrifice because he thinks he's just too important. But if he's got under your skin with these conspiracy theories, then go ahead and snoop away. I'll tell you this, though - when your organization is based on spying, there are bound to be secrets on top of secrets, but the one thing you can trust in this world is me."

He nodded, placing his hands on her shoulders to calm her down, "I believe that, Cate, I really do...but I still have to know."

"Fine," she relented, "You go spy on the spies while I actually stay on target and figure out our Loki problem. Try not to get into too much trouble."

"Thank you," he said sincerely and released her so they could go their separate ways.

The confrontation bothered Cate all the way to the bridge. She and Steve had never fought before and it was the first time he'd raised his voice at her since the waking up incident. Maybe he wasn't ready for a stressful mission like this yet, or maybe Stark was just a bad influence on him; but she couldn't shelter him forever. Every bit of her believed that he had the potential to be the backbone of this team, and if he had to shake off some paranoia to get there, then so be it.

"How bad were those files?"

"Huh?" Cate looked up in confusion and belatedly noticed Phil standing next to her terminal.

"You left to get some files," he elaborated, "And now you come back looking like you just watched a Hydra puppy-kicking experiment."

"Oh...no," she made an effort to finally focus on what she'd come there for, "No answers in the files, but we're not just going to wait around for Dr. Banner to locate the Tesseract. Nat's going to do her thing and see if we can get Loki to talk too much." She indicated her screen where the security footage of the glass cell was pulled up in preparation for Natasha to arrive on the scene.

"Good initiative, agent," he gave her a proud smile, "Keep me informed of your progress and if there's anything I can do to assist. Have you even had lunch?"

She couldn't help the look of disgust that her face twisted into, "Why are you doing that? You're a top project manager, mission coordinator, and team leader. Why are you making people food and stroking their egos?"

He lowered his voice so that, despite their proximity to other stations, it became a private conversation, "To be good at any of those things means looking after every need of your team. In order to coordinate a successful mission, I have to know my team better than they know themselves. I need them to be focused and healthy - both mentally and physically - when they're out in the field, which means I need to anticipate their every need so they won't be distracted from the mission. The Avengers Initiative is made up of some volatile personalities that may mix together like a bad chemistry experiment, which makes my job even more important. Keep the team happy by any means necessary, so the only fight they'll have is with the enemy."

"Ok, I see the advantage of checking in on us when someone seems unfocused," she sneered again, "But making food? That should be beneath you."

He smiled patiently, "It's not glamorous, sure, but a well-fed team is a happy team. I'll do whatever I need to help my team perform at the top of their game. Now, I'll admit that regular food doesn't work on _you_, in particular, given your ridiculous sweet tooth, but that's all part of knowing everyone as intimately as I need to for this bunch."

"Oh yeah?" she leaned back casually, "And what need of mine have you anticipated to keep me happy in lieu of food?"

"Well, I designed this masterpiece for you, didn't I?" he began by gesturing to her suit.

As he continued, however, she became distracted by the sight of a tall, blonde armored figure wandering onto the bridge. She hadn't seen Thor since everyone parted ways at the quinjet and their only interaction had left her feeling awkward. Even now as he was clearly out of his element and looking around uncomfortably, their eyes met and she quickly averted her gaze to Phil and nodded, though she had no idea what he was saying at this point. Behind him, she could see that Thor was approaching their position, probably because they were the only crew members he recognized, but for some reason it still made her nervous. How could one act natural around an all-powerful alien?

"Ah, Thor," Phil greeted as the god joined them, "I trust you've been all set up with your comm link now. And I was just telling Agent Mills that I have confirmation on her jet service. She's all fueled up, so as soon as we have enough information out of Loki, she'll be able to take you wherever you need to go in order to transport yourselves back to Asgard."

"Yeah," she agreed, meeting his eyes again and immediately forgetting what she was going to say next.

"I'm pleased to hear that," he nearly smiled, "She's an excellent captain."

"Yes, she is," Phil agreed, looking between the two of them a few times, "Anyway, I'm glad you're here; I've been meaning to put you at ease about Dr. Foster."

"Oh?" he broke eye contact with Cate and looked up at Phil, "Is she safe? When I heard of Erik Selvig's fate, I feared the worst."

"I anticipated you might," Phil nodded, with an inside joke smile directed at the other agent, then offered, "We could call her right now, if you want to check on her."

After a short hesitation, Thor glanced back down at Cate for some reason then back at Phil, "That will not be necessary at this time. As long as you can assure me she has been spared from the destruction Loki has wrought."

"Absolutely. Let me show you," Phil moved over to his own terminal and Thor followed.


	7. Chapter 7

Cate forced her attention back toward her screen and pulled on her headset to monitor the audio from Loki's cell, where he appeared to be pacing aimlessly. A camera outside the detention center showed Natasha finally getting into place near the door.

A moment later, her voice popped into Cate's earpiece, "Ready to begin interrogation, Cate. You monitoring?"

"Eyes on you, Nat," she answered, "Room is clear. You are good to proceed."

Cate leaned forward in anticipation and put her hands over the headset to drown out the conversation that Thor and Fury were having nearby. With smooth, quiet movements, Natasha slipped into the detention center and glided towards the glass cell. It took a few seconds for Loki to stop pacing and acknowledge her presence.

"There's not many people who can sneak up on me," he said, turning to face where she stood.

"But you figured I'd come," Natasha brushed off the compliment.

"After," he admitted, "After whatever tortures Fury can concoct, you would appear as a friend, as a balm - and I would cooperate."

"I want to know what you've done to Agent Barton," she got straight to the point.

Cate raised her eyebrows at the directness of Natasha's approach, then furrowed them again as the video suddenly lagged and the audio buzzed.

"...say...expand-...mind…" came the choppy reply from Loki as the feed struggled to overcome the lag.

The video started to pixelate and fracture and then the entire window closed, followed by the window for every subprogram she had been running simultaneously. She was about to try a reboot, when a giant banner appeared over the center of her screen, flashing the words "VIRUS DETECTED" and "UNAUTHORIZED ACCESS." As she pulled off her headset and stood partially up to look around, she found that every other terminal was plagued by the same warning and a general murmur had started to rise in the coordination bay. Fury brushed past quickly on his way back up to the command deck and Maria Hill moved from terminal to terminal, trying different functions to get more information on the virus. Worried that it might be sabotage from Loki or his potential moles, Cate had to restrain herself from calling Natasha over comms to warn her. Disrupting her concentration now could be disastrous.

Fury took one last sweeping look down at the worried crew members, then turned and walked out of the room like he was on a mission. Cate looked to Phil and Thor, who were still standing by the window, staring back at her in confusion.

Just then, Natasha opened up their comm again with an edge of urgency to her voice, "Loki means to unleash the Hulk. Keep Banner in the lab. I'm on my way. Send Thor as well."

"Copy that. Good work, Nat," Cate replied, stepping out from her terminal to approach the window, "Thor, I need you to go to the lab. Your brother is planning to release the Hulk somehow, and we need you to stay close to Dr. Banner to make sure that doesn't happen."

"Agent Romanoff?" Phil guessed.

Cate nodded, "I need to get my terminal back online to see what all is going on, but that's as much as she got out of him. She's headed to the lab too."

"Alright, let's see what we can do with the computers," he looked at Thor, "And you remember how to get to the lab?"

"Yes," the Asgardian dipped his head towards Cate, "I'll do as you have asked, my lady. Dr. Banner shall be under my protection."

"Thanks," she couldn't help but smile briefly at this and then lose her focus as she watched him walk swiftly across the bay with those long steps of his.

"Agent Mills, let's try my terminal," Phil jolted her back to attention and they gathered around his computer while he tried a few different commands.

"If it's a virus, it's in there deep," she growled, "The lockdown is system-wide."

"I.T. is on their way," Maria announced in a loud voice from the front of the room.

Cate rolled her eyes, "Great, we gotta wait for them to get here all the way from the machine room, just so they can suggest turning our computers off and on again."

"Well...have you tried it?" Phil asked, reaching for the power button.

Just before he could hit it, the warning window disappeared and all his programs automatically started booting themselves back up. He and Cate exchanged an unsure look.

"OK, we're back online, people," Maria called, "I want a full diagnostic on flight controls to make sure no systems were compromised. Everyone else, man your stations and make up for the lost minutes."

"Check on Loki," Cate suggested and Phil pulled up the live security feed of the prisoner sitting patiently on the bench in his cell.

"He's not going to draw out the Hulk like that," Phil shook his head, "There's more to his plan. He's waiting for something."

"Well, let's prepare for it," she folded her arms, "You're the all-knowing coordinator, Agent Coulson. Tell us how to protect Dr. Banner. Can we put him to sleep? Put him in a cell for a bit?"

"That was his cell," he gestured at the screen, "Anything else would be about as useful as putting him in a wet paper bag. The most effective protection is Dr. Banner's own conscious self-control. Hopefully Agent Romanoff and Thor will be able to secure the environment for him to prevent any-"

The end of his sentence was cut off by a loud rumble and violent lurching of the ship. Cate would have toppled out into the walkway, if Phil hadn't grabbed her arm to stabilize her. As an alarm started wailing, they both looked to the giant windshield where bits of flaming debris were flying out into the air trailing smoke on their descent to earth.

"Status, now!" Maria ordered over the rising commotion and pointed at the comms officer, "Put the crew on red alert."

Immediately he announced over the shipwide PA system, "All hands to stations."

Some of the sector commanders rushed from the bridge to get to their teams. The flight crew members around the upper deck were all leaning intensely towards their screens and swiping between reports while department coordinators ran from station to station, calling out updates to each other.

"Where'd that attack come from?" Cate leaned over Phil's shoulder to inspect the security feed that he still had up, which now showed Loki sitting up a little straighter and looking around with interest.

"External detonation," Maria was reading from the screens at her command post, "Number three engine is down! Can they get it running?" she approached one of the engineer stations, "Talk to me."

"We've got a fire in engine three," someone else confirmed.

Cate tuned the rest of the ruckus out as Phil pulled up a schematic of the helicarrier and pointed to the impacted area, "Access to engine three shares a direct corridor with the lab."

"The team!" Cate realized and they both jumped into the walkway in a flash.

"Check on the ones who were in the lab, then meet me in the detention center," he instructed, moving towards the nearest staircase while Cate split off and ran for main door.

Maria's voice suddenly announced through their earpieces, "Somebody's got to get outside and patch that engine."

"Stark, you copy that?" Fury checked in immediately.

"I'm on it," came the almost overlapping reply from Stark.

"Coulson," Fury continued, "Initiate defensive lockdown in the detention section, then get to the armory. Romanoff?"

There was a worrisome long pause before Natasha's breathless, "We're okay."

As she ran down the hallway, Cate noticed all the agents jogging past with rifles in hand. Of course this was in response to the red alert, but she hadn't heard any confirmation of enemy infiltration. Just to be safe, she pulled out her own gun and held it ready as she burst into the stairwell and took them two at a time. When she reached the right level, she had just started to lean against the door when it vibrated to the sound of a blood-chilling primal roar. So Loki's plan had worked. They were all in real danger now.

Cate tensed and took a shaky breath, then shoved the door open and raised her gun - as though it would have any effect on the Hulk. She looked carefully up and down the debris and smoke-filled hallway before stepping out into the open. In one direction she saw through the haze and flashing lights movement by someone wearing an unmistakable bright blue bodysuit.

"Steve!" she yelled, jogging towards him as he turned and ran towards her as well.

"Cate," he exclaimed in relief, "You're all right!"

"Bridge wasn't hit," she explained quickly, "Where are the others?"

"We were all in the lab," he pointed unsurely in the wrong direction, "Then the whole thing exploded. Stark and I ran out to see what was happening...how do I get to engine three?"

"You just ran out of the lab without seeing if everyone was okay?! Now we've got Hulk on the loose!" she cried, then bit her lip in response to his resulting look of shame, "Never mind, I'll check on them. Just take that hallway, turn left at the T, and look for the door on the right with the yellow and black markings to get to the engine room for number three."

"Thank you," he patted her shoulder quickly, then ran past her toward the path she had indicated.

She hurried on to the lab, where it was clear the explosion had done more direct damage, but she was relieved to find it empty except for the debris. Whoever had been in here had obviously been mobile enough to evacuate. She was rounding the tables, boots crunching over shattered glass from the blown-out back window, when she spotted the alien scepter lying on the ground, buried partially under debris. Had this somehow contributed to the attack, as she suspected? She bent down to pick it up and when she stood again, she immediately caught sight of a pair of armed personnel in full body armor trotting through the doorway. For a moment, she wasn't sure if they were S.H.I.E.L.D. security or not, but then they leveled their rifles at her and she dived behind the nearest desk while rapid fire passed over her and rained down more broken glass. The tough material of her suit prevented her from suffering any cuts from the window shards as she rolled into a crouch and took a deep, focusing breath.

They had body armor, so she would have to aim carefully. With one hand, she launched the scepter over the top of the desk like a javelin, then immediately raised herself up enough to get off two quick shots over the surface of the table. Distracted by the incoming weapon, both goons took a bullet between their upturned eyes, and their bodies hit the floor at the same time as the scepter. Cate quickly jumped over the table and retrieved the staff, taking swift steps towards the door. There was no way she was letting these invaders get the alien weapon or the prisoner, himself.

She had nearly reached the door when it was suddenly blocked by a new figure. Recognition slowed her hand after reflexes had brought it up to level her gun at him.

"Clint?" she gasped in tentative relief.

In that moment of hesitation, he lashed out with a fist to the side of her head and she heard something crunch. Before she was even done processing that blow, she felt a hard kick to her gut that knocked her backwards onto the floor. During the second it took her to fall that far, she realized a couple things: firstly, that Clint was definitely still under the mind control they had been warned about, and secondly, that he had been holding back on her in all their years of sparring. But now that she knew all that, she also knew what to expect next; so as soon as she hit the ground, she rolled sideways and spun the scepter over her to hopefully deflect whatever arrow Clint was undoubtedly firing at her. Sure enough, an explosion just next to her spoke to the effectiveness of her maneuver and sent her tumbling again. Somehow, she emerged unscathed, and as she rolled to her feet, she made a mental reminder to thank Coulson for the durability of this suit. That explosive arrow had blasted a gaping hole right through the floor.

Clint was jumping to attack again, but she dodged and redirected his strikes with the help of the scepter. Having spent enough time with her partners and getting used to their fighting style, Cate was encouraged by the knowledge that Clint wasn't the best close-range combatant. He was still excellent, by agency standards, but nowhere near Natasha's level. And at least when Cate sparred with him, she always had the height advantage.

After the frustration of having most of his attacks blocked, Clint hit a control that changed his bow from being strung to being locked in a straight position and the battle turned into a bo staff duel. Cate was still hesitant to go for any truly damaging attacks, but after being on the receiving end of a few more merciless hits, her anger overruled her loyalty and she lashed out with a quick combination of staff twists and a leg sweep that threw her opponent off balance just long enough for her to spin into a kick. The force of it sent Clint stumbling backwards and right over the edge of the hole his explosion had created. She heard the thud of his body landing and the clatter of his bow a moment later, and she stepped to the edge with her gun already drawn and aimed.

He was lying on his back on the floor below, his weapon out of reach and his face looking up at her from the center of her pistol sight. Although his eyes held a steely challenge to them, all she could see was little Cooper's smiling face, waiting for his dad's next "vacation," and she loosened her finger on the trigger.

"Coward," Clint growled up at her, rolling to snatch his bow and run out of view.

Cate hissed out a breath and hurried from the room in case he tried to bring the floor down from under her feet. He had run in the direction of the bridge and she tried to open her comm feed to warn everyone, but there was no click to indicate her mic was live. She touched her ear and felt pieces of her com link dangling out of it, suddenly realizing what that crunch had been after the first punch. She pulled out the useless tech and tossed it to the floor as she ran. Flying blind would make this battle a little more complicated, but she'd done it before; she'd just have to rely on her instinct, and right now her instinct reminded her that Coulson was counting on meeting her in the detention center.

The ship was shaking and there were distant crashes and shouts coming from various directions, but Cate had to ignore them all as she tried to remember which obscure service staircases or catwalks would provide the quickest route to the detention center. As soon as the door was in view, she ducked down and sprinted the rest of the way in a low crouch with her firearm ready.

"Damn it," she hissed to herself upon spotting the black-clad thug already inside.

From her quick glance, it seemed that Loki was still in his cell and Coulson was nowhere in sight, thank goodness. She'd have to sneak around the opposite way and intercept him at the armory. Another peek through the door gave her pause, though. The henchman was walking towards the control panel, from where it would only be a simple sequence of buttons to open the cell and release that crazy alien onto the ship.

Jumping up from her position, she burst through the door and fired off a few shots at the man, who flinched from at least one hit to the arm as he dodged and returned fire with his rifle. Cate rolled across the catwalk, narrowly avoiding his wild spray of bullets, and shielded herself behind a metal barrier so that she could set the scepter down and steady her gun hand as she popped off a couple more shots toward the control panel behind which her opponent was now hiding.

"Put your hands up!" she yelled, planting herself on one knee and lining up her aim.

Instead of hands, the enemy's rifle barrel popped over the top of the panel and the crossfire erupted simultaneously until Cate heard the dreaded click of an empty chamber coming from her gun. Realizing what the ceasefire from his opponent meant, the man slowly stood up behind the panel and smirked, savoring the assurance of victory.

Cate leaned back behind the barrier, analyzing her hopeless predicament for any way out. In a matter of very little time, he was going to shoot her and release Loki into an already chaotic situation. Even worse, Coulson was bound to arrive at any moment to meet her and would unsuspectingly stumble right into this mess too, considering that the door from the armory had even less visibility into the chamber than the direction from which she had entered. She had to warn him somehow - she had to warn _everyone_ \- but without comms, it was going to be a suicide mission.

In what appeared to be a meaningless gesture of frustration, she slid her pistol aside and felt a tiny sense of relief as the barrel of it lodged directly into the space under the armory hall door. Phil would definitely see it before coming in and know that something was wrong. Gripping up the scepter with both hands now, she braced herself. She had no idea how to control the powers of this weapon, so it was little more than a knife in a gunfight.

There was an intercom on the other side of the room which she could use to send out a shipwide warning. She just had to get to it and hope to finish enough of her message before being shot. She was tensed to run when, for some reason, she glanced up in front of her at the glass cell and saw Loki watching the entire event with interest. Eye contact with him was unnerving enough to give her pause.

His gaze flicked up from her to the back of the room where his henchmen was standing, "Stop this ridiculous barrage, you'll damage my scepter. She poses no threat, so release me now."

"No!" Cate burst up from her hiding place without thinking and aimed the business end of the staff like a rifle, mentally begging it to fire the type of energy blast she'd seen Loki use, but nothing happened.

The thug chuckled and lowered his gun, reaching back to hit a button on the control panel. As soon as she heard the motors of the cell door engage, Cate flipped the staff from a firing position to a combat grip and sprinted for the intercom. Only a few strides into her run, though, she was startled into a misstep when Loki appeared right in front of her out of thin air. She spun to avoid colliding with him while simultaneously slashing out with the scepter, but it cut straight through him like he was a hologram. For the moments it took her to regain steady footing, she recalled everything she'd read about the Asgardian and seen him do, preparing herself to counter however possible and trying not to panic. This guy had tossed Steve around like a toy.

She spared a quick look around the room, but of course there was no sign of Loki, only the henchman, who was now leaning against the wall with an amused look on his face. There was no point in looking for a fight, anyway, because it wasn't one she could ultimately win. She knew her only goal was to get to that intercom at all costs, so she made a run for it again. This time she didn't startle when the alien appeared in front of her, already midway through a kicking motion. The staff, angled defensively across the front of her, took the direct impact and slammed into her body with enough force to knock her back. She held onto the weapon tightly and turned the fall into a backwards roll that ended with her on her feet and ready to block again.

Loki calmly walked towards her, "So kind of you to bring the scepter directly to me, agent. I had others tasked with that chore, but this is far more enjoyable."

Not listening to a word he said, Cate was busy calculating her best chances. It was a rare scenario for her to be the shorter participant in a fight, but her one advantage was that he was unarmed. She didn't need to defeat him, she just needed to get past him.

This time, she jumped forward with the first attack, slashing with the knife edge of the scepter and hoping that Loki would dodge, opening up a path for her to run past. Instead, he blocked the blade with the metal bracer on one arm and counterattacked with a jab from his other arm. Cate spun the staff out of the slash to block the jab and ducked low, intending to aim for his less-armored legs next - he'd _have_ to move for this one. Somehow, his arm was quicker and he blocked again, this time wrapping his hand around the staff momentarily before Cate sacrificed her defensive position to twist it out of his closing grip.

Loki was moving quickly to strike at her unguarded arm when suddenly the entire room shook and lurched to the side as the helicarrier made sickening drop. Cate lost her balance completely and was falling straight toward the railing, so she instinctively let go of the weapon with one hand to guard her head from the impact. A moment later, she felt a blow to her shoulder which was so jarring that she couldn't maintain a strong enough grip on the scepter to prevent it from being yanked out of her hand. The next second brought a dizzying change of direction, a sharp pain in her back, difficulty breathing, and a sense of vertigo. When her senses finally caught up to her body, she found herself being bent backwards over the edge of the railing by Loki's grip on her neck. Muscle memory took over and she slammed her fist into his arm from an angle that would break a normal assailant's choke hold, but he didn't even flinch. Finally, she resorted to digging her fingers under his to keep him from crushing her throat.

He brought the blade of his scepter out to rest against her chest and looked thoughtful, "You seem useful. Unfortunately, I already have everything I need."

In one swift motion, he moved the sharp edge up under his hand and slashed it across her throat, then threw her the rest of the way over the railing. Cate focused in terror on the stinging sensation from her neck, even as she felt herself bounce off the outside of the glass cell and plummet down the ejection chasm beneath it. When she finally slammed into the bottom of the metal pit, everything was blurry and moving in slow motion. She lay there, trying to reconcile her mind to real time again and shift her limbs against the painful weight that had settled on them. How was she still alive? How long until she wasn't?

Finally she was able to bring her hand up to her neck, in what she thought would be a futile effort to apply pressure to a fatal wound. Instead she found only a rip in the impenetrable fabric of her suit's high-necked collar and beneath it, a shallow cut that merely painted her fingertips with blood, but would certainly not kill her. She took a deep breath and felt her eyes well up with tears of relief. Coulson's suit had saved her life.


	8. Chapter 8

A distant yell echoed down from the detention center, followed by some commotion and a muddled crash. Suddenly the suspended prison cell shook and dropped a few inches as the release mechanisms creaked open slightly. Cate's eyes went wide and she felt a shot of adrenaline bring everything into focus. If that chamber fell, it would either crush her or launch her out into open sky. She pushed herself up onto her knees and crawled towards the nearest service ladder.

There were voices overhead now, so she mounted the ladder and climbed as quickly as the pain would allow, listening for any signs of a battle. She had only ascended a few feet when she heard a muffled shout that sounded so angry, it made her heart start racing. In the silence that followed, she continued to pull herself up, rung by rung, wondering nervously why the talking had stopped. Suddenly the floor below irised open and wind howled up into the tunnel, tearing at her. She drew herself tight against the ladder and clung on with all her strength. Just when she started to fear that she would lose her grip, the prison cell dropped, shooting past her back with barely a few inches of clearance. The suction of it passing nearly succeeded in ripping her from the ladder and she was only holding on by one hand when the chasm finally sealed itself again after the ejection of the cell.

Gritting her teeth, she resumed her climb and only paused when she heard a blast and a loud crash from above. Although she had a long way to go still, it probably wouldn't end well for her if she emerged straight into a battle, considering her condition. But, following the crash, everything in the detention center went completely silent and Cate continued to pull herself up. Luckily, the task became a little easier as the helicarrier leveled out and slowed its descent. By the time she was nearing the top of the chasm, she could hear doors opening and footsteps running across the grated floors. For a moment she worried that the detention center might be overrun by Loki's people, but then she heard the unmistakable voice of Director Fury and felt a wave of relief to know that S.H.I.E.L.D. had retaken the area.

This relief died immediately when the next rung propped her up high enough to see over the edge of the pit and she spotted Fury kneeling over a mortally-wounded Agent Coulson. Phil was clearly struggling to draw breath when his focus dropped from Fury's face and down to where Cate had just appeared. She froze the moment their eyes locked and he stopped fighting for that breath. A dread as shocking as ice water washed over her, but she couldn't move, she couldn't even breathe, with his lifeless eyes still glued on her. Finally, Fury stood up and a medical team obscured Cate's view of Phil, kicking her muscles back into action. She dragged herself up the last few rungs and rolled onto the floor at the director's feet, listening in shock as the paramedics pronounced Coulson dead.

Fury looked down at her, his eye scanning her condition as he remarked in an even tone, "You made it."

"Coulson…" she tried to strangle her emotion the way he was, but it cracked through anyway.

"Loki," he said simply.

"Where is he?" irrational rage and vengeance brought new life into her body and Cate staggered to her feet while the medics turned their attention to her and began poking and swabbing at her visible injuries.

Fury regarded her with a thoughtful eye, even as he shook his head, "He's gone, Agent Mills."

Cate clenched her jaw and stared back down at Phil as her wounds were bandaged and her arm was injected with some kind of pain killer. She listened half-heartedly as Fury made the announcement over comms.

"Agent Coulson is down...They're here. They called it."

As usual, her mind was racing for a solution, even as she felt stupid for trying to solve something like death. But then it struck her, she _had_ studied about a solution.

"Sir," she straightened up and looked at Fury, "Permission to take Agent Coulson to Tahiti?"

Anger flashed across his face for a split second and he turned to the medics with a tone they didn't dare question, "She's fine now. Move your sweep to another sector." As soon as they were alone in the room, he addressed Cate, "Project T.A.H.I.T.I. is way above your security level, Mills. Why do you know about it?"

"I've worked closer with Coulson on the Avengers Initiative than anyone," she explained quickly, "He wanted me to know about it. And who cares how I know, anyway? Let me take him there. Now."

"That procedure is meant to be used for a fallen Avenger…"

"Sir, it's _Phil_!"

Fury silently looked at the dead agent for a few seconds, then replied quietly, "Nobody else can know where you've gone."

"I won't say a word," she promised, "And I'll cloak my jet."

"Dr. Banner and Thor went overboard during the battle," he informed her, "I'll tell the others you're missing as well."

Cate bent down, grabbing Coulson's arm and rolling him onto her shoulders. Fury helped steady the body as she heaved herself back to her feet, then they exchanged nods and headed in their separate directions. As short as he was, Coulson was still heavier than Cate had imagined and she had to be very careful as she staggered through the most obscure route she could think of to reach the hangar. When she arrived at that deck, she was amazed by the amount of damage. Thankfully, there was enough chaos and injured people, that nobody looked twice at her on her way to the quinjet, which had somehow survived the battle.

She carefully slid Phil's body off her shoulders and into the copilot's chair, gulping at the deep crimson that now completely stained his clothes. As she buckled him in, she glanced down at herself and found that his blood had completely run down her own suit, darkening every white and red highlight and casting the dark blue to a blacker shade. Fighting the urge to rip the whole thing off, she touched the tear in the neck and reminded herself how much she owed her coordinator - enough to put up with a soiled combat suit for a little longer.

Cate settled into her own chair and pulled on her helmet, indulging momentarily in the comfort of a live comm in her ear again. But she wasn't waiting for an opening in the chatter to request departure permission from flight control, she was listening for any possible conflicts with her completely unannounced takeoff. As soon as it sounded like the bay door was clear for a long enough window, she fired up her engine and took off from a cold start, straight out the door and away from the helicarrier as quickly as possible. There was a burst of angry protest from flight control, which she ignored as she activated every manner of cloaking that her quinjet was equipped with. The crew had bigger things to worry about than a rogue bird, and frequent glances at her radar screen confirmed that nobody had bothered following her.

The secret facility that housed the T.A.H.I.T.I. project wasn't terribly far, less than an hour if she pushed the jet to top speeds. It was just enough time for the weight of the battle to really settle on her and give her hands a severe case of trembling. She hadn't been trained for this level of combat - aliens and magic and brainwashed allies. She shouldn't have taken on Loki alone; that was a stupid move, and she was lucky to have survived the encounter at all. Phil hadn't been quite as fortunate, yet he was just as capable as she was. Fury said that Thor and Dr. Banner had fallen too. She wondered how Natasha had come through and if she felt nearly as out of her league as Cate did. Steve was probably fine - he was tough - but she couldn't help worrying anyway. Phil would be worried. He would be checking on every member of his team right now, if he could - even Stark - but Cate didn't dare try to contact anyone on the ship while she was on a top secret mission.

"Agent Mills," a voice crackled into her helmet, causing her to jump, "Do you read me?"

"I read you, sir," she glanced at her comm panel, making sure Fury was coming through on a secure channel, "I'm fifteen minutes out from target."

"Copy that," he paused, "Your team is headed to New York after Loki on an unauthorized operation with no coverage. They're going to be a mess without a coordinator."

Her heart tightened up at the way he worded that, but she grasped for a shred of hope, "If the procedure works, Agent Coulson will-"

"Even if it works," he interrupted, "Coulson's survival will have to remain a matter of top level security. The Avengers cannot know. They will need a new coordinator."

Cate felt everything in her chest sink to rock bottom, and she clenched her jaw so hard that she couldn't reply.

"Agent…"

She gulped down the lump in her throat and attempted, "Surely Agent Hill or Agent Sitwell would be-"

"You said it yourself, Mills, you worked closer with Coulson on the Avengers Initiative than anyone. He would _want_ you take over for him."

"I can't just watch from a terminal while the others go off to fight. I belong in the field - I want to be with them!"

"But the Avengers _need_ someone like you calling the plays from home base. You wouldn't hesitate to give your life in a fight for your teammates, yet you can't make the real sacrifice and set aside your ego to support them outside the battle. I would expect this from someone like Stark, but I thought you were more like Coulson. He only cared about making sure the team was at their best, not whether or not he was the hero."

Even if she were able to think of a response to this accusation, it had been followed by the definitive click of the channel closing, leaving her with nothing but heavy silence. She glanced at the seat next to her and winced. Nobody could be as good as Coulson, but the Avengers deserved someone that good. It just wasn't her.

Besides, she scowled stubbornly, how dare he compare her to Tony Stark! She was prepared to sacrifice more for this team than he ever would.

Fortunately, her approach to the secret facility was a welcome distraction to the maelstrom of thoughts in her head, and she focused on preparing an argument for ground control to allow her to land. Apparently, the director had called ahead, though, because they guided her down without any resistance and even had a stretcher waiting out on the landing pad. Cate got as far as carrying Phil's body down the ramp of her jet before the T.A.H.I.T.I. team took over. She jogged after them as they wheeled the stretcher back into the facility, but when they reached the doors to a segregated wing, she was intercepted by a security officer.

"I'll need to see your clearance, agent," he planted himself in front of her.

She watched desperately as the doors behind him closed, cutting off her view of the stretcher. A dreadful feeling came over her that even if the procedure worked, she wouldn't see Phil again for a long time. If it didn't work, she hadn't really said a proper goodbye to him.

"Your badge," the guard prompted, and she pulled her S.H.I.E.L.D. ID card out, ready for the inevitable ejection when he saw her clearance level.

To her shock, the ID scanned in as Level 7 - one higher than she had been when she left the helicarrier. It was Agent Coulson's level.

"Thank you," he handed the card back to her, "But I'm afraid only medical staff are permitted in the operating theatre."

"Oh, ok," she stared at the doors helplessly.

"Ma'am, are you-" he gave her a second up-and-down look, "Do you need medical attention?"

"No," she said simply and wandered away.

Cate vaguely remembered the path they had taken through the facility which would lead her back to the landing pad, but now that she was alone and the urgency gone, she stopped halfway and sat down with her back against a metal pillar. With her face in her hands, she looked through her fingers at her blood-soaked suit. Could she really keep up with the other Avengers? Was Coulson wrong to add her to the team in the first place? They were all off to New York to jump right back into the fight, and here she was, doubting herself, when she had a more personal score to settle with Loki than any of them, besides possibly Thor...wherever he was.

She tilted her head back for a deep breath and focused for the first time on the location she had unknowingly stumbled upon for her meltdown. The room was filled with a field of short metal pillars, like the one she was leaning against, each with a shielded dome on top, guarding an artifact. As her eyes moved from dome to dome, she realized that all of the artifacts appeared to be of alien origin. She stood up and looked around at the vast number of them, most of which had purposes which were impossible to identify. A few were very clearly weapons or armor and she even spotted a few jars full of mysterious liquids. The section that really drew her interest was a row of restraints in diverse sizes designed for beings with various anatomy. Her mind drifted back to how easily Loki had broken off S.H.I.E.L.D.'s strongest handcuffs during the abduction from her jet. If the rest of her team had gone to New York to recapture him, how exactly did they plan to hold him once they caught him? Perhaps alien restraints were built tougher.

After picking out a few items that seemed like they'd fit a humanoid of Loki's size, Cate carried the armload out to her jet. At least _someone_ was thinking ahead and preparing before rushing off on an unsupervised mission. The Avengers really did need someone looking out for them. She rejected any further thoughts down that road, though. Coulson had put her on the team because he needed someone he could trust in there. Steve was untested, Stark was completely untrustworthy, Banner was a liability, Thor was a wildcard, Clint wasn't even on their side, and Natasha didn't do her best work in teams larger than two or three. Cate _had_ to be in the field with the team so that S.H.I.E.L.D. could count on at least one of them to make the right calls.

Setting her navigation to take her to New York City, Cate activated the autopilot and pulled up a screen to see if mission control on the helicarrier was actively sending out any orders to her and the rest of the Avengers. She was stunned to find that no instructions were being broadcast at all. It was understandable that home base had a lot to worry about after the recent attack, but why would they let their star team go in blind to capture a maniac alien? She switched to civilian news feeds and her mouth dropped open as she scanned the reports of untold damage and chaos. Apparently, the entire city was under attack by a whole army of monstrous aliens emerging from a wormhole in the sky. She'd never seen anything like it...and her friends were somewhere in the middle of it. Poor Steve, barely up to speed on the average modern world, was probably losing his mind at this. Cate immediately minimized the news feed and switched off the autopilot, kicking her jet into turbo speeds.


	9. Chapter 9

As she neared the coastline, Fury's voice broke into her comm with an edge of panic, "Mills, what's your twenty?"

"Headed for New York, about a hundred miles off the coast of Manhattan. I see you haven't sent any other air support for my team..."

"Listen to me, agent, there's another fighter inbound from south of your position carrying a nuclear payload."

"Toward the city-?!"

"Just listen to me!" he said sternly, "I need you or Stark to take that jet out."

At that moment, she caught sight of the blip finally appearing on her radar, "It's a S.H.I.E.L.D. fighter… why would you authorize-?"

"That pilot is following orders from the World Security Council. You are following _my_ orders. If you want to save millions of people and your team-"

"Understood, sir, I'm moving to intercept," she cut a hard turn to the south and observed, mainly to herself, "I might be too far out…" just then, the blip appeared to split in two on the radar as the jet peeled away, "He fired!"

There was no point pursuing the other craft at this point, but she might still have a chance at shooting down the bomb, if she was fast and accurate enough. It would detonate close enough to kill her and thousands of other people, but at least it wouldn't be millions. She didn't even think twice before redirecting toward the fiery pinprick of the missile's rocket boosters. Before she could get a target lock, though, another missile swooped up from the water and connected with the warhead. She flinched, but there was no explosion. They seemed to be flying in tandem. Her finger hesitated on the trigger for some reason, and she glanced down at her radar. The second missile wasn't a missile at all, her computer identified it as Iron Man. What was he doing?

She let go of her targeting controls and moved her hand to another board to switch through radio channels until she found the frequency that the rest of the Avengers were using for comms.

"...know that's a one-way trip," Steve was saying.

Cate looked up from the trajectory that Iron Man was on and focused on the portal hanging in the sky over the city, breathtaking and terrifying at the same time. Was Stark headed toward it on purpose? There was no telling what would happen if someone got too close to it. He reached the city long before she did and executed a sharp rise straight up into the vortex before disappearing from sight and from the radar.

Stunned and confused, Cate cut out her turbo engines and tried to redirect her attention to the other aerial threats she could handle. Some sort of gigantic flying creature was in her proximity so she lined her flight path up in preparation to engage with it, but then it seized up inexplicably and fell out of the sky. She locked the quinjet into hover mode and looked around for a moment, hoping to get a handle on the changing situation.

"Close it," Steve's voice said quietly over comms.

This order was followed quickly by the disappearance of the light beam that was connecting Stark Tower to the portal above. Immediately the portal collapsed in on itself and disappeared, causing Cate's gut to churn at the realization of Tony Stark's fate. Suddenly her eyes caught sight of a small speck against the blue sky. The speck plummeted rapidly until it was close enough for her to see that it was actually Iron Man in a deadly free fall toward the city. Cate hissed in a gasp, preparing herself for the helpless position of having to witness another colleague die, when suddenly a giant green figure sprang out from the side of another building and caught the limp armor, carrying it in a slightly more controlled tumble to the ground.

Hulk? She shook her head. What was going on here? How much had she missed?

Engaging the thrusters again, she tracked her teammates to where they landed and began a careful descent between the buildings to their location. Steve and Thor were on the scene by the time she got close enough to see them clearly, and she reached over to disengage the stealth paneling, so as not to startle them when she landed. As soon as her jet was visible, she noticed Thor looking up at it as he said something, though apparently not over comms, then Steve turned to look as well. She saw Stark lift his head for a glance too and she was relieved that he was conscious after such a fall.

The moment the jet touched down, Cate had already unstrapped from her seat and pulled her helmet off, jogging to the back hatch as it lowered. She paused at the bottom of the ramp, not entirely sure what good she would even do here at this point.

"Cate?" Steve's mouth dropped open as soon as he recognized her and he stood up immediately, closing the distance between them with a few brisk steps, so that he could trap her in a smothering embrace, "You're alive! What happened?"

It was the first time Steve had ever initiated a hug, so Cate enjoyed it for a moment before feeling her heart sink when she realized it would also be the first time she flat-out lied to him, "There was an explosion. I got trapped and knocked out. They dug me out during clean up and I came as fast as I could."

"How-?" he started to ask, holding her back to get a better look at her bloody suit.

"Where's Loki?" she interrupted.

"My brother is probably still aloft," Thor growled, flicking his eyes toward the top of the nearest skyscraper as he reached down to help Stark to his feet.

Hulk growled in reaction to this and Cate spared him a nervous glance before nodding, "I'll fly us up. Everyone in the jet."

"We're heading for the top of Stark Tower to retrieve Loki," Steve said out loud, holding his hand in an awkward position near his ear, "Agent Romanoff, Agent Barton, meet us there."

"Barton?" Cate repeated in disbelief.

"You missed _a lot_, hun," Stark smacked his hand down on her shoulder before staggering up into the jet.

She frowned and swallowed her frustration, hurrying past everyone to take her seat and get them airborne. Natasha and Clint, wearing his new suit, were waiting for them on the landing pad, looking almost completely unscathed.

"He's still unconscious," Natasha said through comms as Cate settled the jet down onto the cement, "But not for long, I'm sure. How are we going to hold him?"

"You all just keep an eye on him until I get in there," she instructed, "I've got a few things that might hold him."

"Cate?" Natasha perked up when she heard the familiar voice and looked up at the jet's tinted windows with a half smile, "Well, there's a relief."

"See you in a minute, Nat," she promised.

The other Avengers had already trotted out of the jet to join the agents in keeping guard over their unconscious enemy, so Cate was left alone to collect the alien restraints she had brought. For some reason, she felt embarrassed when she realized she'd have to ask Thor if he knew what any of them were and if they would actually work on Loki. In fact, she just felt a general sense of embarrassment over all.

She was lying to her friends now. As a Level 7 agent, she was probably going to need to lie to them a lot more than she wanted to. On top of that, she was sharply aware of what they'd clearly accomplished during her disappearance. Steve had stepped up as a leader, Natasha had held her own in a battle that should have been out of her league, Clint had somehow recovered and rallied enough to take his place alongside the other Avengers, Banner had returned from his fall and harnessed the Hulk to be useful in battle, Thor had worked together with this team of human strangers, and Stark had surprised everyone by nearly paying the ultimate price to save them all. They had done it, and they had done it without her. They didn't need her.

Cate took a moment to look out at the smoke rising from the destruction in the city below. They only thing this team _did_ need was direction, something to keep them organized and collateral damage to a minimum. Someone willing to sacrifice their ego as easily as they would sacrifice their life. She sighed and trudged into the debris-strewn lounge, briefly amused by how intense everyone looked as they kept their weapons trained on a now conscious yet completely deflated Loki. He turned to regard her as she entered, blinking in surprise when recognition finally settled on him. For her part, eye contact with him again made her blood run cold and she felt a hate more intense than anything she'd ever experienced.

"Don't let him move," she said through clenched teeth, "Thor?" her eyes moved to him, instantly relieving some of the tension, "Would any of this work on an Asgardian?" She held out her armload of alien artifacts.

"These are old but of good craftsmanship. Designed for shapeshifters," he picked up a pair of cuffs connected by a chain, then touched a muzzle-like binder, "And we may need this as well."

As soon as Loki was securely restrained, everyone visibly relaxed a bit and exchanged respectful pats on the shoulders. Even Hulk finally staggered backwards and underwent an exhausting transformation back into the human form of Dr. Banner.

"Poor guy," Natasha said quietly from where she and Cate were exchanging a quick hug, "We owe him a lot."

"Seems like everyone really stepped up," Cate agreed, watching as Stark brought a fresh shirt over to the doctor.

"Coulson would have been proud," she said sadly before squeezing Cate's arm, "I assume you heard about what happened…"

"Yeah," she lowered her eyes with genuine pain, "I heard about Coulson."

"Cate," Clint joined them and she turned to latch onto him with a fierce hold while he chuckled.

"Clint!" she squeezed him even tighter, "I'm so glad I didn't shoot you in the face."

"...what?"

"I mean - it's so good to have you back."

"Yeah," he aimed his smile between the two ladies, "So, here we are...Avengers, now."

Cate's expression fell and she immediately saw the confusion on her partners' faces; but before she could articulate anything, Tony Stark sauntered up behind them.

"Lovely reunion and all, agents," he twirled his hand impatiently, "But I'm starving and I believe we're going for shawarma, so..."

Clint and Natasha scowled with momentary annoyance, but Cate nodded, "You guys go ahead. You need to eat. I'm going to take Loki back to base and get started on recovery efforts."

"You're not joining us?" Stark looked disappointed and gestured up and down at her suit, "Maybe you weren't around for our battle, but you were clearly putting up a fight somewhere. You're still part of the team."

She shook her head, dreading the words that were about to come out of her mouth, "I'm not on the team anymore. I'm moving up to take Agent Coulson's place as coordinator."

Natasha gave a respectful nod and clapped her hand over Cate's shoulder, "He would have been honored to see you take over."

"Thank God it's you," Clint added in a whisper, "We all know how unreliable the other mission coordinators are."

"Wait, what's happening?" Steve asked as he, Thor, and Banner finally joined the conversation, "Are you quitting, Cate?"

"No, I'll just be...supporting from now on," she tried not to sound disappointed, "Who knows, maybe I'll still be able to join you on missions from time to time; but I'll mainly be keeping an eye on the bigger picture - taking care of you all."

Steve smiled at the familiarity of this situation, "Well, I can't think of anyone better for the job."

This actually brought a small grin to her face and she patted his chest, "And if I know anything about taking care of _you_, Captain Rogers, it's that you're probably hungry right now. Go get your shawarma."

_A few days later_...

The worst part about her promotion to coordinator was that Cate now took orders directly from Fury, himself, and she was suddenly aware of how much personal interest he took in the Avengers Initiative, which Coulson had been shielding her from before. On his orders, she was now awkwardly wandering alone through the taped-off sections of Stark Tower's upper floor because its owner had mentioned on a whim that the renovated tower could be a sort of second home base for the team. She didn't know the first thing about architecture, but Fury had sent her to inspect the space and assess its potential.

With a jealous longing, she indulged in a quick mental roll call on her team - something which she would have to make a habit of if she wanted to be half as good as Phil at this job - and wished she was with any of them instead of here. Clint and Natasha were already off on new S.H.I.E.L.D. missions until Cate needed to call them back for an Avengers-level job. Steve was at home when she'd left that morning, but would probably be out helping with the neighborhood clean up by now. He'd become far more comfortable with his independence lately and there was even talk of relocating him to a solo apartment closer to the D.C. headquarters. Thor had taken the Tesseract the day before and used it to transport himself and Loki back to Asgard. He hadn't communicated any clear plans to return, but Cate decided to keep his file active anyway in the vain hope that he would end up on her team again someday. Stark and Banner were holed up somewhere in one of the many floors below her in this very tower, probably still geeking out over science-y things she couldn't understand. The recent exposure to alien tech and biology had been quite the shock to them both and suddenly there were a lot of new things to study.

When she entered the next room, a layer of dust broke loose and showered down on her. She coughed and scooted under a more stable-looking section of ceiling. Should she be wearing a hard hat for this inspection? Bitterly she brushed the dust off the old jumpsuit she had started wearing again. Now that she wouldn't be in the field for a while, she had retired her combat suits to back of the closet. Her Avengers suit had been deemed a biohazard and unsalvageable, so it was confiscated by the armory for destruction.

_It's a room. Needs work_, she finally typed into her datapad, shaking her head. What else did Fury expect her to assess from this inspection?

As she shoved open the door to the next room, she was startled to see someone else already occupying it, sitting on a plastic covered couch near the shattered glass wall. He looked just as surprised when she entered, but quickly covered it with a pleasant smile.

"You should have told me you were visiting, Agent Mills, I'd have given you the personal tour."

"Sorry, Mr. Stark," she kept her hand on the door handle, "The director sent me over on boring Avengers business. I didn't mean to bother you."

"You're not a bother," he started, but then trailed off like he didn't have the energy to conjure up something more offensive.

She was about to back out of the room quickly and leave him alone, but suddenly she couldn't shake the echoes of the dread she had felt when she watched him fall from the sky during the Battle of New York. She couldn't take her eyes off the glass of whiskey in his hand and she couldn't pretend she hadn't seen the haunted look on his face in that moment before he had noticed her entrance.

"I'm sorry," she announced, "I judged you unfairly when you first joined the team, and I was wrong. What you did for the others… you're a better man than I gave you credit for. I'm sorry for how I was."

For a second he seemed genuinely touched, but then he shrugged and stared down at his glass. A couple times he opened his mouth to say something, but then closed it again without making a sound. Cate was tempted to escape the awkward atmosphere her confession had stirred up, but she knew that her predecessor would never have left one of his team members in such an obviously unstable state. This was one of the people she had promised to take care of. What would Coulson do?

She forced a kind tone into her voice, "Is there anything I can do for you, Mr. Stark?"

"It's Tony. You don't work for me," he corrected casually, pulling out a second glass from under the table and pouring it half full of whiskey before looking up at her expectantly.

Cate hesitated for a second, then closed the door and walked across the room to join him.

_One year later..._

"Is this really that serious, or did you just miss us?" Clint called from the lounge.

"Director Fury seems to think it's that serious," Cate's voice echoed out of the kitchen before she emerged with a tray of hors d'oeuvres and a smile, "And I _did_ miss you."

Natasha snatched one of the mini quiches off the tray before Cate even reached the table, "Hey, if you feel like assembling the team for nothing more than a light brunch, I'm okay with that. Where do you even find these? They're delicious."

"You'll be at HQ for longer than brunch, I'm afraid," Cate set the tray down and immediately turned her attention to her datapad as she spoke, "I called you all here for a series of Hydra strikes that the director says will require Avenger-level force. You've got fifteen minutes to eat, then I'm briefing you in the second floor meeting room, and then it's off to battle sims to prep for the new tech we've been encountering in recent cells. I haven't quite finished setting up all your quarters on the helicarrier, but I should have it done before tonight. I'm sure I can squeeze it in after mission packet prep…"

Eyebrows raised in concern, Steve offered, "Do you need some help?"

"I can handle it," she smiled, hoping it was convincing.

"You need an assistant," Tony declared.

"Fury would never approve the expenditure for additional personnel," she dismissed this suggestion, "I've got everything under control, guys."

"You're going to burn out," Clint muttered around a mouthful of food.

"Pitch it as an assistant to _him_," Natasha suggested with a shrug, "Then hijack the person for us."

Cate narrowed her eyes as she shook the crumbs off the empty platter with one hand and answered an email on her phone with the other, "Fury's assistant? What a nightmare. I'd have to completely lie on that job description or else nobody would ever apply for it."

"Are you kidding?" Tony looked smug, "Just use the word 'Avengers' and they'll be lining up outside your office. Everybody loves us."

She glared at him, "You realize I put out your PR fires as well, right?"

Ignoring this, he made a few quick motions on his phone and smiled up at her, "There you go, doll. I just sent you the performance reports on the top ten graduates out of the CIA Academy over the last four years. Consider your recruiting field narrowed. You're welcome."

"I'm sure this is highly illegal," she mumbled, feeling her datapad buzz as the attachments arrived.

"Promise us you'll look into it," Steve said seriously, "Everyone knows we've got the best coordinator in S.H.I.E.L.D., but you won't be able to stay at the top of your game if you get too overwhelmed."

Clint nodded, "And if _you're_ not at the top of your game, _we're_ not at the top of our game."

"And then earth gets destroyed and then how guilty would you feel?" Tony finished.

Cate rolled her eyes.

"Just promise us," Natasha pointed at her.

"Fine," she raised her arms in surrender, "I'll hire an assistant. Now get up to the meeting room, all of you, we have a briefing to start."

**Author's Note: This ends the intro story to a much larger series I'm working on which explores the behind-the-scenes adventures of the anonymous support team behind the Avengers. With Cate as lead mission coordinator and Fury's new trusty assistant at her side, they have to keep one step ahead of the super team while still thanklessly mopping up their messes. When I wrote this, I intended it to fit seamlessly into the first Avengers movie, with all of the action taking place just off camera or between scenes, so that it could believably exist within canon. It even adds a bit of depth or set up to things that just happen in the film without explanation. UNTIL the stupid time travel in Endgame went and revisited the scene from this chapter that I had already written and ruined everything. I'm not changing it.


End file.
